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“On Writing is Stephen King's 2nd 'non-fiction' book,...”

★★★★★

written by Bojangles on 29/01/2006

On Writing is Stephen King's 2nd 'non-fiction' book, the first one being "Danse Macabre", which was first published back in 1981. I haven't read 'Danse Macabre'(don't really plan to either), but I don't need to read it in order to know that this book is not only Stephen King's best non-fiction book out of the two, but one of his top 10 (or 15) best of all time. And he has a lot of books, too. 50 or more, I believe.
To put it basically, the title speaks for itself.

"On Writing."

It's a book, "On Writing."
In the first section of the book, Stephen King talks about his life from when he was a small boy, and all kinds of hilarious things in between, and to when he grows into a 'man', and gets his first book, Carrie, published by Doubleday. Mainly, it's not an autobiography, the author claims, but a way to show the reader, 'how a writer (like himself, and at that, a very famous one) was shaped into the writer he is today.' Like quoted from the book: "A writer can be formed, but not made."

In the following sections is where he begins talking about the art and craft of writing, but more specifically his craft, fiction writing and 'story-telling/story-writing.' It doesn't scan upon such writing topics like non-fiction or essay writing, or report writing or 'how to write a review' on whatever (and if those types of writing are what you are hoping to excel upon, this book is not for you - try something like "Writers Inc." they have everything, from 'how to write a book review' to 'story writing' to 'poem writing' or 'how to write a report' and many more)- only on his craft, fiction writing, but it does go over a very, very small section on non-fiction, more specifically, the report of a basketball game which would be published in his school newspaper (since he was back then, a writer for his school newspaper/s), but it's only a paragraph from the first draft, and after some minor cuts and editing and revising, so it can't be counted as much. Mostly fiction, like I said.

He goes over such topics in 'good fiction writing' like: Dialogue attribution, character development, good story (or a situation. Stephen doesn't like or believe in 'plot', you'll see why if you read the book, which I totally recommend, and especially if your an aspiring writer, or if you want some good laughs) pace, theme, symbolism, drafting, editing, revising and everything else in between. For example, he says adverbs (heartily, peacefully, quietly, slowly, quickly; words mostly ending in 'ly') are in most cases, useless and bad, and only add to the story's dullness, deadwood, and slowness; also thinking that only popular commercial writers who only care for their money and want to cheat their way through their books, only use adverbs.
Or, he says that the passive verb is bad, and that the active verb is much better (Passive Verb: The rope was thrown by John, Active Verb: John threw the rope).
He also gives practical advice to the beginner writer, like: "If you don't have the time to read, you don't have the time or the tools to write."
"If you want to be a good writer, you must do two things above anything else: read a lot and write a lot."
And much more.

In the following sections, he goes through his rendezvous with a truck that hit him, almost killing him, and his hospital time; his struggles to write, and so on. Emotional it is, very; and in the 2nd to last section, he specifically goes over editing and revising.
For the example, he uses a few inception pages from one of his short stories (which appears in the audio collection: "Blood and Smoke", and also in his most recent short story collection, "Everything's Eventual") 1408. He shows the reader the first draft of the first few pages of the story, and then how it looks and reads after it is edited and revised.
As he states: "The first draft of a story is like a person standing in front of a mirror with only his socks and boxers on, and after the heavy editing and revision coming from the 2nd draft, is when the person starts putting on his 'out' clothes, putting on his shoes, putting on his watch, coming his hair, maybe even putting on a hint of cologne as well; when he is finally ready to face the world."

Finally, in the last section, which is the shortest of them all, only consisting of a few pages, he gives a list of the top 100 books or so that he read in the last '3 - 4 years', which he says, 'will change the way you write, if not, entertain you, for they certainly did for me.'
Everything from "As I Lay Dying" by William Faulkner, to "Hocus Pocus" by Kurt Vonnegut, to "The Poet" by Michael Connelly, to "Heart of Darkness" by Joseph Conrad, and many more.

And when I finally read the last book and the author it was by, in the last section, turning the page to only find white, blankness; knowing that the book has finally ended, I was sad. I was very sad. It was such a good book, still is of course, and it has finally ended. But like the saying goes, "All Good things must come to an end." I suppose so. But still the memory and the soul of the book, still remains in my memory and soul. Like the front flap of the book says, "It will empower and entertain everyone who reads it." That is 100 percent true, without one doubt at all. This book has left me mind-blown, wiser, stronger with insight, 'empowered and entertained', with a heightened sense of admiration and respect towards the author, and I know if you read it, it will leave you the same way too.

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