BOOKS FOR WRITERS

In 1976 I placed an article with Writers Digest, parlayed that into a monthly column, and nattered on about writing for the next fourteen years. I never meant to set myself up as an authority on the writing of fiction --- there is no such thing --- but I found that, much as writing makes one a better reader, so did writing about writing have a salutary effect on me, both as reader and writer. And the book that resulted evidently fill a need. Three of them are still in print after all these years.

If there’s an explanation for the ongoing popularity of these books, I think it may lie in the fact that I haven’t tried to tell anybody how to do anything. I talk about some of the challenges I’ve faced at the keyboard and how I’ve responded, and share some things I’ve noted in the course of my own reading and writing. While the books are largely about the writing of fiction, feedback suggests that writers of all sorts tend to find them useful. (At least that’s how it looks from here. On the other hand, those who find the books worthless tend not to write fan letters. . .)

1

WRITING THE NOVEL FROM PLOT TO PRINT. Writers Digest Books, 1979. Never out-of-print since its initial publication. As the title implies, this book's specifically about the writing of novels. The hardcover first edition is rare. The trade paperback's widely available.

2

TELLING LIES FOR FUN & PROFIT. Arbor House, 1981. The most popular of my writing books. Collectors can get the hardcover first edition, with the Brian Garfield intro, directly from me; it's generally quite rare, but I have a good stock of copies. The Morrow trade paperback has the same text, except that there's a new intro by Sue Grafton. NEW! Telling Lies for Fun & Profit is now available as an unabridged audiobook, narrated by Lawrence Block. This 6-cassette, 9-hour tape is available exclusively from us---click here to order!

3

WRITE FOR YOUR LIFE. Self-published, 1986. In the early 80s I developed an experiential seminar for writers, and spent a couple of years presenting it around the country. (And stopped; it took all my time and never did show a profit.) People who took the seminar reported it helped them make enormous progress in their writing, and several took it two and three times. I wrote this book in an effort to make the seminar's material and processes available to a wider audience, and published it myself so that I could have copies in a hurry, and because I'd always wanted to try self-publishing. It worked; we printed 5000 copies and sold all but a handful of them. The first (and only) edition has become quite collectible, as hardly any copies ever found their way into the aftermarket. Now that it's for sale as a HarperCollins e-book, I've made my small stock of first edition copies available to collectors via this website's LB's Bookstore.

4

SPIDER, SPIN ME A WEB. Writers Digest Books, 1987. The sequel to Telling Lies. It has never sold as well, probably because the title's less of a grabber. I think it may actually be more the incisive of the two. Tough to find in hardcover, but the Morrow trade paperback's in print and well-distributed.