"What do you think of my fiction book writing?" the aspiring novelist
extorted.
"Darn," the editor hectored, in turn. "I can not publish your novel! It
is full of what we in the business call 'really awful writing.'"
"But how shall I absolve this dilemma? I have already read every tome
available on how to write well and get published!" The writer tossed his
head about, wildly.
"It might help," opined the blonde editor, helpfully, "to ponder how NOT
to write a novel, so you might avoid the very thing!"
Many writing books offer sound advice on how to write well. This is not
one of those books. On the contrary, this is a collection of terrible,
awkward, and laughably unreadable excerpts that will teach you what to
avoid--at all costs--if you ever want your novel published.
In How Not to Write a Novel, authors Howard Mittelmark and Sandra
Newman distill their 30 years combined experience in teaching, editing,
writing, and reviewing fiction to bring you real advice from the other
side of the query letter. Rather than telling you how or what to write,
they identify the 200 most common mistakes unconsciously made by writers
and teach you to recognize, avoid, and amend them. With hilarious
"mis-examples" to demonstrate each manuscript-mangling error, they'll
help you troubleshoot your beginnings and endings, bad guys, love
interests, style, jokes, perspective, voice, and more. As funny as it is
useful, this essential how-NOT-to guide will help you get your
manuscript out of the slush pile and into the bookstore.
