Story Starters: How to Jump-Start Your Imagination, Get Your Creative Juices Flowing, and Start Writing Your Story or Novel - Softcover

Stanek, Lou W

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0380795523 ISBN 13: 9780380795529

Publisher: William Morrow & Company, 1998

Synopsis

If you have the passion and energy to write fiction, but have trouble finding an idea and getting started, this is the perfect book for you. Lou Willett Stanek has helped scores of new authors in her acclaimed writing workshops--and now she shows you how to look and listen, how to find stories and begin shaping them like a writer.

Here's how to find inspiration from neighbors and strangers, reshape classic tales, cull current events and use other tricks of the writing trade so effectively you'll soon find yourself brimming with ideas, your imagination revved to its full potential. Begin with a snippet of overheard conversation, an unexpected event, a simple character trait, a place, a problem--Ms. Stanek teaches you to get past "what really happened" and reinvent reality in ways that will astound and delight you, and hold a reader's attention.

Here too are hundreds of "what-ifs," simple situations you can guide to endlessly different conclusions--and use to learn new ways to fashion plot, describe character, develop conflict, paint with language, create a setting, employ flashbacks, build suspense, and much, much more. For every writer who could use a jump-start, from novice to pro, here is a book that will help you keep the faith and. . .

Thousands of stories are just waiting to be told--by you. Get started!

About this title

About the Author

Lou Willett Stanek, a novelist, critic, and teacher, practices what she preaches. She bases her workshops on the theory described in this book. Dr. Stanek earned a Ph.D. at the University of Chicago, an M.A. at Northwestern, and a B.A. from Eastern Illinois University. She also served as a trustee at Millikin University. A Midwesterner, Dr. Stanek now lives in New York and teaches writing at The New School of Social Research.

From the Back Cover

What If . . .
. . . every classmate passed the bar exam--except one?
. . . the killer left a calling card--the ace of spades?
. . . she was a sleeping beauty--
but it wasn't prince's kiss that woke her up?
. . .he had history of obsessive behavior--
and then he developed a passion for. . .

Thousands of Stories Are Just Waiting to be Told--By You

If you have the passion and energy to write fiction, but have trouble finding an idea and getting started, this is the perfect book for you. Lou Willett Stanek has helped scores of new authors in her acclaimed writing workshops--and now she shows you how to look and listen, how to find stories and begin shaping them like a writer.

Here's how to find inspiration from neighbors and strangers, reshape classic tales, cull current events and use other tricks of the writing trade so effectively you'll soon find yourself brimming with ideas, your imagination revved to its full potential. Begin with a snippet of overheard conversation, an unexpected event, a simple character trait, a place, a problem--Ms. Stanek teaches you to get past "what really happened" and reinvent reality in ways that will astound and delight you, and hold a reader's attention.

Here too are hundreds of "what-ifs," simple situations you can guide to endlessly different conclusions--and use to learn new ways to fashion plot, describe character, develop conflict, paint with language, create a setting, employ flashbacks, build suspense, and much, much more. For every writer who could use a jump-start, from novice to pro, here is a book that will help you keep the faith and. . .

Get Started!

Edition details

• Publisher: William Morrow & Company
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0380795523
• ISBN 13: 9780380795529
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 192