Monday
Aug162004
WRITERS: The Write Stuff
Monday, August 16, 2004 at 01:34PM
(This review originally appeared on The Rebel Housewife Reviews in August 2003.)
Now that the kids are headed back to school, I'm looking forward to getting my back-to-school groove on too. For me, that's getting back to the writing. The manuscript for Rebel Housewife Rules: Reality Check! is due in November, which seems like such a very long time away--but so did the first day of school--and it's here again already!
November (and the whole busy, manic holiday season) will be here before we know it. I have to admit to enjoying something of a summer hiatus on The Book, and now it's time to get back to a schedule and get back to work!
So for my own self-motivation, and for fellow aspiring authors among our readers, I've gone back to the bookshelf to find books of inspiration and encouragement to get back in The Mood--(that's the writing mood, stay with me now!).
There are more than a few terrific books on writing, of course, and it might take parts two and three along the way, but here is definitely a great place to start, even if you are not a writer, but appreciate very well-written true-life angst and humor:
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year
Anne Lamott is laid-back, down-to-earth and FUNNY. You might think "A Journal of My Son's First Year" could be very sappy and sentimental, but not when the mother is a writer, struggling to survive and make ends meet; a single mother talking openly about the process of embracing (and surviving) that decision; a recovering alcoholic and manic-depressive-type personality, who manages to be brutally honest and hardest on herself, at the same time poignant, sarcastic, and really funny; and last, but not least, when the subtext throughout the entire book, this crazy year in her life and the wonder of her son's first year, is shadowed with the illness and death of her closest friend. This is non-fiction, real life, and I'd have to say, after reading several of her novels, which were 'good'--it's her non-fiction that makes Anne LaMott a tremendous writer.
Bird by Bird is just funny, and extremely helpful for putting all the anxiety and difficulty of trying to accomplish something (in this case, writing) and surviving real life and your own inner turmoil all at the same time, in perspective. My favorite chapter is "Shitty First Drafts"--so very, very true. Bird by Bird is truly not all potty talk and crass irreverence, but if you are looking for proper English, textbook-type reading on the process and fundamentals of writing, this might not be for you. I'll leave you with a quote:
"To be engrossed by something outside ourselves is a powerful antidote for the rational mind, the mind that so frequently has its head up its own ass--seeing things in such a narrow and darkly narcissistic way that it presents a colo-rectal theology, offering hope to no one."
~ * ~ Order from The Rebel Housewife at Amazon ~ * ~
Now that the kids are headed back to school, I'm looking forward to getting my back-to-school groove on too. For me, that's getting back to the writing. The manuscript for Rebel Housewife Rules: Reality Check! is due in November, which seems like such a very long time away--but so did the first day of school--and it's here again already!
November (and the whole busy, manic holiday season) will be here before we know it. I have to admit to enjoying something of a summer hiatus on The Book, and now it's time to get back to a schedule and get back to work!
So for my own self-motivation, and for fellow aspiring authors among our readers, I've gone back to the bookshelf to find books of inspiration and encouragement to get back in The Mood--(that's the writing mood, stay with me now!).
There are more than a few terrific books on writing, of course, and it might take parts two and three along the way, but here is definitely a great place to start, even if you are not a writer, but appreciate very well-written true-life angst and humor:
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
By Anne Lamott
(Anchor Books/Doubleday (paperback), 1995)
Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year
By Anne Lamott
(Fawcett Columbine/Ballantine Books (paperback), 1994)
Anne Lamott is laid-back, down-to-earth and FUNNY. You might think "A Journal of My Son's First Year" could be very sappy and sentimental, but not when the mother is a writer, struggling to survive and make ends meet; a single mother talking openly about the process of embracing (and surviving) that decision; a recovering alcoholic and manic-depressive-type personality, who manages to be brutally honest and hardest on herself, at the same time poignant, sarcastic, and really funny; and last, but not least, when the subtext throughout the entire book, this crazy year in her life and the wonder of her son's first year, is shadowed with the illness and death of her closest friend. This is non-fiction, real life, and I'd have to say, after reading several of her novels, which were 'good'--it's her non-fiction that makes Anne LaMott a tremendous writer.
Bird by Bird is just funny, and extremely helpful for putting all the anxiety and difficulty of trying to accomplish something (in this case, writing) and surviving real life and your own inner turmoil all at the same time, in perspective. My favorite chapter is "Shitty First Drafts"--so very, very true. Bird by Bird is truly not all potty talk and crass irreverence, but if you are looking for proper English, textbook-type reading on the process and fundamentals of writing, this might not be for you. I'll leave you with a quote:
"To be engrossed by something outside ourselves is a powerful antidote for the rational mind, the mind that so frequently has its head up its own ass--seeing things in such a narrow and darkly narcissistic way that it presents a colo-rectal theology, offering hope to no one."
~ * ~ Order from The Rebel Housewife at Amazon ~ * ~