Making a Literary Life
by Carolyn See
Book Summary Information
Author: Carolyn SeeEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2003-08-26
ISBN: 0345440463
Number of pages: 288
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Book Reviews of Making a Literary Life
Book Review: Remarkable, Funny, Required Reading
Summary: 5 Stars
Carolyn See has written a book that is hard to put down-- no small feat for a 'how-to' book. I loved it. Written with a humor and good will and honesty, her book is a goldmine of information for writers. I'm sure I will be re-reading it many times.
Summary of Making a Literary Life
As Carolyn See says, writing guides are like preachers on Sunday-there may be a lot of them, but you can't have too many, and there's always an audience of the faithful. And while Making a Literary Life is ostensibly a book that teaches you how to write, it really teaches you how to make your interior life into your exterior life, how to find and join that community of like-minded souls you're sure is out there somewhere.Carolyn See distills a lifetime of experience as novelist, memoirist, critic, and creative-writing professor into this marvelously engaging how-to book. Partly the nuts and bolts of writing (plot, point of view, character, voice) and partly an inspirational guide to living the life you dream of, Making a Literary Life takes you from the decision to "become" a writer to three months after the publication of your first book. A combination of writing and life strategies (do not tell everyone around you how you yearn to be a writer; send a "charming note" to someone you admire in the industry five days a week, every week, for the rest of your life; find the perfect characters right in front of you), Making a Literary Life is for people not usually considered part of the literary loop: the non-East Coasters, the secret scribblers.
With sagacity, a magical sense of humor, and an abiding belief in the possibilities offered to "ordinary" people living "ordinary" lives, Carolyn See has summed up her life's work in a book so beguiling, irreverent, and giddily inspiring that you won't even realize it's changing your life until it already has.
From the Hardcover edition.
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