The case for craft books

I know some of you are already cringing. “But I hate craft books!” you say. “But they stifle my creativity! But they’re prescriptive!”

Yes and no.

First of all, if any book is stifling your creativity, that’s a problem. Second, if they’re prescriptive in their writing, you don’t have to listen. My approach to craft books is like my approach to Tarot. Take what resonates and leave the rest.

Third, craft books are great when you want to do a deep dive into a specific area. Whereas, learning by absorption (which doesn’t work for everyone) will take many books and much more time. Or maybe you do both!

Remember: take what resonates.

C.J.’s best of list

Now that I’ve got you rabid for craft books (lol), let’s take a look at my favorites over the years, divided by material covered. I’ll put it there that I’m not affiliated with any of these, nor do I receive any payment from their sales. Just joy.

Structure

You’ll notice this is the meat of the list. I firmly believe that structure is the single most important lesson you could learn as a writer. For some people, structure is absorbed and innate. For me, it took a lot of study. The weakness of this list is that it relies heavily on Western three- and four-act structure. If you have books (or even articles!) on non-Western or non three-act structures, please put them in the comments! I’ve had a hard time finding resources.

The Anatomy of Story - John Truby

My love. My bible. The first structure book I read, and I still use it today. It presents a format for structure based on a central moral argument and succeeding revelations. An organic structure, rather than one based on time points.

The Anatomy of Genre - John Truby

Truby applies his organic structure to various core genres of writing, including Mystery, Fantasy, Romance, Sci-fi, etc.

Creating Character Arcs - K.M. Weiland

If you buy one Weiland, get this one. Here, she outlines a way to create a thematic argument through your character’s transformation (or lack thereof) over the course of the novel. It incorporates her structure points, so you get more bang for your buck.

Structuring Your Novel - K.M. Weiland

If you want to deep dive into three act structure, I haven’t found a better book. Yes, better than Save the Cat.

Write Your Novel From the Middle - James Scott Bell

A fascinating little book that teaches you how to structure your novel using the midpoint as the crux on which everything else is based.

Save the Cat - Blake Snyder

The gold standard of screenplay writing. Useful to know, because a lot of people use Snyder’s terminology.

Save the Cat Writes a Novel - Jessica Brody

Relatively interchangeable with Snyder, except with novel-based time points and examples. Pick one of the two.

Outlining and Planning

I am a plotter. If you’re not a plotter, that doesn’t mean it’s not useful to learn how to outline! You may someday have to write a synopsis on a book you haven’t written yet. So consider checking out one of these resources.

Outlining Your Novel - K.M. Weiland

I’d read this after you read her Structure novel. It teaches you how to outline using structural markers.

The Nutshell Technique - Jill Chamberlain

A fun one! This technique teaches you how to outline both books and scenes using things like goal, frustration, etc.

Editing and Revising

I’m thin on these. The next edition of this list, I hope, will contain more. Got recs? Please put them in the comments!

Seven Drafts - Allison K. Williams

You don’t need to do all seven drafts prescriptively to find benefit from Allison’s techniques. She goes over seven types of revision and how to do them.

Genre-Specific

Books that cover specific genres. I don’t know how to elaborate on that.

Writing in the Dark - Tim Waggoner

A guide to writing horror, featuring everything from structure and scares to what kinds of trauma you can inflict on the human body.

Romancing the Beat - Gwen Hayes

Using Save the Cat structure, this book addresses the unique challenges of writing romance, including specific beats you don’t find in other genres. Useful if you’re writing romance as an A plot or subplot.

POV

These three books recommended by Jeni Chappelle have changed my writing more than almost any other book but Truby. They took my writing from bland, “She yawned tiredly” writing to “Her shoulders drooped; she sighed, yawned. Lord, was she tired!” writing. I could not recommend them enough.

Voice - James Scott Bell

The weakest of the three; read the first half and the rest if you like exercises.

Rivet Your Readers With Deep POV - Jill Elizabeth Nelson

If you buy one of these, buy this one. It’s short and explains deep POV and how to write it efficiently.

Understanding Show, Don’t Tell - Janice Hardy

Also quite good. Goes more into depth on deep POV and all the various scenarios and tell-words, for people who like specifics.

Setting

Another place where I’m looking for recs. However, the one book I have here is fabulous.

A Writer’s Guide to Active Setting - Mary Buckham

A beautiful little book that teaches you how to use the five senses to up your setting game, and how to make setting its own character.

Emotion

No, I did not include The Emotion Thesaurus, only because I don’t use it so I don’t know if I like it or not.

The Emotional Craft of Fiction - Donald Maas

A weird, lovely book that has a lot of good exercises and forces you to think deeply about how we craft an emotional experience in fiction.

Specific Skills

Here’s where all the extra, fun stuff comes in! I just bought some books on Crime and Poisons so expect this list to get bigger!

Fight Write - Carla Hoch

Practical advice for writing fight scenes, starting the basics of how our bodies work all the way to creating your own choreography.

Dear Writer, You Need to Quit - Becca Syme

Let’s get into career stuff! Tough love about what to do when you’re feeling burnt out.

And so

We come to the end. But it’s not an end end because there’s always more to read! Is there a book you think should be on this list? Tell me about it in the comments, on Twitter (@sarcasmlemons), on Bluesky (@cjsubko), or via carrier pigeon.

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