Writing Advice

Here is a short, and shockingly incomplete list of my favorite writing books.

Writing Down the Bones  & Wild Mind Natalie Goldberg
More Zen approach to writing, Goldberg is at her best with these two - her first books.   Her advice and roots are in the automatic writing craze in the mid- 19th century as well as Jack Kerouac and his theory of spontaneous writing.
Goldberg believes we are all writers and she is kind and encouraging in her advice to  both the novice writer and the advance writer.

Bird by Bird   Anne Lamott  (local writer, lives in Marin)  Most of her work is spiritual and recovery oriented.  She's a more Christian writer in her approach. Bird by Bird, one of her first books and only book on writing, is her best.

Poemcrazy  Susan Goldsmith Wooldridge
Even if you don't write poems, this book will help you jar out of your regular habits and see and write about the world in a different way.

The Artists Way & The Right to Write   Julia Cameron
Cameron is famous already so she tends to lapse into moments of poor me getting by with only a handful of famous friends book contracts and a substantial Income from her ex- Martin Scorsese.  She is spiritual as well and her advice has a more Christian focus. She, like Goldberg promotes the idea of a little writing every day.  Goldberg calls it 10- minute write, Cameron calls the work, Morning Pages.
These two books - the original Artist Way and the Right to Write are Cameron's best. Which hasn't stopped me from buying too many of her recent books, many of which repeat the advice from the first Artist Way copy.