Write That Book Already!: The Tough Love You Need To Get Published Now (23 page)

Leslie Levine

Author of
Wish It, Dream It, Do It
, recommends
If You Want to Write: A Book about Art, Independence and Spirit
by Brenda Ueland.

Norman Mailer (1923–2007)

Whose last book was
The Castle in the Forest
: “I confess to being high on
The Spooky Art.”

Norris Church Mailer

Author of
Cheap Diamonds
, in a random incidence of great minds thinking alike: “My favorite book on writing is
The Spooky Art
by Norman Mailer.”

Donna Wares

Editor,
My California: Journeys by Great Writers
and the brains behind
www.californiaauthors.com
: “Carolyn See’s
Making a Literary Life: Advice for Writers and Other Dreamers
is inspirational and quirky and a fun read. Carolyn’s mantra: ‘A thousand words a day, five days a week, for the rest of your life.’ I also like
How to Write a Book Proposal
by Michael Larsen. His slim volume is a terrific roadmap for crafting a smart proposal.”

Harriet Chessman

Author of
Someone Not Really Her Mother
: “I’d recommend David Huddle’s beautifully written book,
The Writing Habit
. I love Huddle’s way of couching advice to writers within honest, quiet, cunningly humorous, and always engaging personal essays.”

THE JAMES JOYCE FAN CLUB

Scott Turow

Author of
Limitations
, writes: “I’d probably pick James Joyce’s
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
, not because I learned anything from it I could ever hope to repeat, but because it so perfectly described the passion to write and made me surer of my own desires.”

Jane Ganahl

Editor,
Single Woman of a Certain Age
, describes the short story that set her on the writing path: “
Araby
by James Joyce, specifically, this passage about a young boy in love with an older girl—I read it as a junior in college and switched from Political Science to English as a major right then. I still get the chills, reading it again! Haven’t we all been there?!”

THE ANNIE DILLARD FAN CLUB

Christine Wicker

Author of
Lily Dale
, suggests “
The Writing Life
by Annie Dillard— beautifully written and minutely observed essays about keeping faith and hope during the torturous process of writing. Two bits of wisdom I think of almost every writing day came from this book. One comes from Dillard’s observation of chopping wood. She says that to chop a piece of wood you have to aim through the wood to the chopping block. It’s the same with writing. If you aim at the words themselves, they’ll have little resonance. You have to strike more forcefully, full heartedly and courageously at the meaning underneath so that the words come tumbling after, flying away in all directions like wood struck with a well aimed ax. The other piece of advice I rejected as absurd and then couldn’t stop pondering—like a lot of the best wisdom. She says that you shouldn’t write about what interests you most but about what interests only you. That one is difficult, but following it yields all sorts of riches.”

Elizabeth Benedict

Author of
The Practice of Deceit: “The Writing Life
is a somber, eloquent meditation on writing that speaks to the difficulties, obsessiveness, and deep pleasures of the process. It also has
the
most useful epigraph, from Goethe, for anyone who does serious work of any kind: ‘Do not hurry; do not rest.’”

THE TOM SWIFT FAN CLUB

Dave Barry

Author of
Peter and the Sword of Mercy
, tells us: “A book that helped me write better was
Tom Swift and His Flying Machine.
I read it when I was ten, and I thought: ‘This is terrible! I can write better than this!’”

READING FOR INSPIRATION

Stephen King

Author of
Just After Sunset
, checks in with “
The Postman Always Rings Twice
by James M. Cain. He tells a story in 128 pages that many of today’s bestselling authors would shoot 500 on. Little tiny sentences, each one a straight punch to the heart. Great book.” We’d like to add that we often find ourselves recommending Steve’s
On Writing
.

Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi

Author of
The Last Song of Dusk
: “Michael Ondaatje’s
The English Patient
shimmers with novelistic brilliance: every page is a lesson in the craft of writing and enchantment. It offers innumerable lessons on plotting, the construction of sentences, the blending of poetry and prose, and it sings with a deep and glistening sorrow.”

Jonathan Kirsch

Author of
The Grand Inquisitor’s Manual
, is inspired by “
The Slave
by Isaac Bashevis Singer.
Any
book by IBS will teach important lessons to a writer about both the craft of writing and the way a writer needs to use his or her head, heart and eye. Singer’s collected stories (newly reissued by the Library of America) offer a wealth of inspiration and instruction. But
The Slave
remains my favorite.”

Lynn Freed

Author of
Reading, Writing & Leaving Home: Life on the Page
, finds that “reading the letters and diaries of great writers can be, if not always inspiring, of some comfort. For instance, Franz Kafka diaries contain the following entry: ‘January 19, 1914: Great antipathy to
Metamorphosis.
Unreadable ending. Imperfect almost to the foundation. It would have turned out much better if I had not been interrupted at the time by the business trip.’” (
The Diaries of Franz Kafka,
1914–1923, translated by Martin Greenberg with the cooperation of Hannah Arendt, New York: Schocken Books, 1949, p. 12)

Jacqueline Mitchard

Author of
All We Know of Heaven
, tells us: “I found
The Birth House
by Ami McKay on a bench in an airport. What a lucky day for me. I nearly missed my plane as I fell head first into this unsparing, emotionally rich but not a bit sentimental story of a young girl who befriends an elderly midwife who claims to have chosen Dora at birth to be the next practitioner of her obsolete art. It was enthralling, transcending any genre, and a darned good story, too.”

Lalita Tademy

Author of
Cane River
and
Red River
: “If you’ve ever wondered how dramatically altered a life could be by making a single momentary choice, read
The Post Birthday World
by Lionel Shriver. With fierce insight and complex, nuanced characters, Shriver tells Irina’s story (hinging on whether or not she kisses a man to whom she is attracted) in alternating chapters of reality unfolding in different directions.”

Diana Abu-Jaber

Author of
Origin
: “Writing a thriller gave me a new appreciation for the form. Among the many wonderful models I turned to, Kate Atkinson’s
Case Histories
was a real standout—a fine confabulation of intrigue and character—one of the most ‘literary’ mysteries I’ve had the pleasure of reading.”

David Leavitt

Author of
The Indian Clerk
, adores Jane Gardam’s
Old Filth
. “She tells the story of a ‘Raj Orphan’—born in Malaysia to a British Colonial bureaucrat at the turn of the twentieth century and then shipped back to England to be educated—and his uneasy adjustment to a world radically different from any he has known. The hero becomes a famous barrister in Hong Kong known affectionately as ‘Filth’ (Failed in London, Try Hong Kong). An engaging, funny, and moving novel.”

Catherine Brady

Author of
The Mechanics of Falling and Other Stories
, loves:

“Marilynne Robinson,
Gilead
. The novel is told in the form of a letter from an aging preacher to his young son; the preacher anticipates he’ll die before his son comes of age and wants to leave this letter for him. Well written and deeply spiritual, the novel achieves a rare thing in creating a convincingly good man in its narrator and making you share his faith in life.
The Selected Letters of Anton Chekhov
. There was once a cartoon in the
New Yorker
with one mechanic, working under a car, peering up at his fellow mechanic to say, ‘And, of course, Chekhov.’ He’s such a perfect short story writer, and his letters are embedded with gems of wisdom, not just about craft but about the honesty a writer must cultivate.”

Harriet Chessman

Author of
Someone Not Really Her Mother
: “One inspiring book is simply a book of poetry by Mark Doty,
Atlantis
. . . I have found great inspiration in the honesty and heft, sharpness, and beauty of his poetic voice. Even though I write fiction, his poetry (which has a beautiful narrative angle, often) inspires me to listen to my best and most fertile writing self. Virginia Woolf ’s essays in
The Common Reader
and other books are also wonderfully inspiring to me.”

Andrew Sean Greer

Author of
The Confessions of Max Tivoli
and
The Story of a Marriage
: “Honestly, I never know what will inspire other writers except work that seems aesthetically related to what they’re working on. I love
War and Peace
, so I’ll give them that, and figure at some point in their lives they will open it and read it and find something that works for them. But I would never expect a writer to read anything except what works for them at the moment. The best we can do is to introduce them to surprises that may inspire: for instance, Richard Hughes,
A High Wind in Jamaica."

SOME AUTHORS’ FAVORITE BOOKS TO GIVE AS GIFTS

Ben Fong-Torres

Author of
Becoming Almost Famous
, likes to give
Elvis at 21: New York to Memphis
by Alfred Wertheimer. “Elvis fans, get ready to get all shook up. Wertheimer got a job shooting publicity photos for various, mostly boring recording artists in the Fifties. Then along came Elvis, and along with him went Alfred—on the road, into dressing rooms, shooting TV rehearsals, in the recording studio, on stage, and, most deliciously, off stage, canoodling with female fans at coffee shops or in a corridor, sneaking a kiss. A stunning volume.”

John Lescroart

Author of
Betrayal,
loves
Turpentine
by Spring Warren: “Spring is tremendously talented and this book has utterly captivated everyone who’s read it. A great present—enjoy!”

Leonard Maltin

Author of
Leonard Maltin’s Movie Guides
: “
Memories of a Munchkin
by and about Meinhard Raabe, the Coroner of Munchkinland in
The Wizard of Oz.
Daniel Kinske has surrounded Raabe’s amazing personal memorabilia with a wealth of other Oz-related material, and commissioned a number of great artists (including the late Al Hirschfeld) to provide interpretations of Raabe’s famous scene in the classic film.”

Sara Davidson
, author of
Leap!
: “For spiritual inspiration, I’d give
Your Soul’s Compass
by Joan Borysenko and Gordon Dveirin.”

Luis Urrea

Author of
The Hummingbird’s Daughter
, loves “Jack Kerouac’s original scroll version of
On the Road,
amazing for fans and road maniacs, with all the bad language, real names, and naughty bits restored—and the new Library of America’s edition of Jack’s road books.”

Crystal Zevon

Author of
I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead: The Dirty Life and Times of Warren Zevon
: “My all-time favorite is
Stories of God
by Rainer Maria Rilke; but this year I’m recommending the beautifully written and thought-provoking novel
Shantaram
by Gregory David Roberts.”