See Jane Write: A Girl’s Guide to Writing Chick Lit–a review.
I meant to get a book on writing children’s lit from the library, but someone had checked it out. See Jane Write, however, sat near the empty spot in the stacks. (With the “chick lit” part of the title conveniently covered by the library’s bar code). So, I picked it up.
I’m glad I did. I’ve already heard most of the advice in here, but I loved the solid encouragement. Ms. Jacobs and Ms. Mlynowski keep their advice light, but practical, and they wrap the whole book in the attitude that writing novels (and getting them published) is an attainable career path. Maybe not an easy career path, but a possible one.
Plus, they do all this with wit and humor (made me laugh out loud at least twice–had to attempt to explain the jokes to J. and botched the translation–ah, the joys of a multicultural household). They included lots of good examples and a couple of lovely bibliographies, too.
Even though the publishing tips are outdated (it doesn’t even mention the possibility of self-publishing), I’d definitely recommend this to any writer friends who’d like a craft refresher or a pep talk.
Looking for more writing/publishing/marketing resources? My reviews of this kind of book are collected on my publishing page.