Is Life Like This?: A Guide to Writing Your First Novel in Six Months - Hardcover

Dufresne, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0393065413 ISBN 13: 9780393065411

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010

Synopsis

“[Dufresne’s] generous, wise, cajoling, stern, and compassionate voice will get you working right away.”―Brad Watson

“Writing a novel,” says John Dufresne, “is not as easy as you may have thought before you tried. But it’s also not as difficult as you imagined.” Dufresne’s smart, practical, hard-nosed guide is for the person who has always wanted to write a novel but has been daunted by the sometimes chaotic, always challenging writing process. A patient teacher and experienced writer, Dufresne focuses his expertise and good humor on helping aspiring novelists take their first tentative steps. His six-month program variously calls attention to the key elements of good fiction writing and offers exercises that are designed to sharpen writers’ command of novel-length storytelling. After six months of guided writing, the users of this book will finish what might have once seemed impossible―a rich and compelling first draft of a novel.

Is Life Like This? may well be the most important addition to the aspiring writer’s library.

About this title

About the Author:

John Dufresne is the author of elevenprevious books, including three fiction writing guides. A professor in the MFA program at Florida International University, he lives in Dania Beach.

From Booklist:

There seems to be a trend lately for authors of how-to-be-a-writer books to supply the reader with a time frame: six months, a year, whatever. Most novelists would probably tell you that writing a book takes as long as it takes, but you can’t deny that having a schedule forces you to buckle down and actually write, as opposed to thinking about writing. And that’s Dufresne’s goal: to get you writing. He covers the usual ground—character, plot, dialogue, etc.—but what makes this guide especially interesting is the way the author takes you through his own story-development process, beginning with a simple character observation and building it, detail by detail, motivation by motivation, into a fully fledged plot. Watching how it’s done, and not merely reading about the process, could be a definite boon to some would-be novelists. Recommended highly for its hands-on, user-friendly approach. --David Pitt

About this edition

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 0393065413
• ISBN 13: 9780393065411
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 314