Create Unforgettable Stories for Kids! You dream of writing stories that children respond to–the kind they come back to again and again. Nancy Lamb can help you achieve that dream. She mixes insightful advice for mastering storytelling with dozens of examples that illustrate a variety of plot-building techniques. Nancy's instruction covers everything from format and content to setting and characterization. She also draws from a range of children's classics, including Where the Wild Things Are, Charlotte's Web and Bridge to Tarabithia to explore and illuminate the unique nature of children's literature. Nancy also shares writing tips and tricks accumulated through years of successful storytelling–invaluable advice for crafting fiction that resonates with children of all ages, from 4 to 14 and beyond.

Nonfiction is in the facts. Creative nonfiction is in the telling. It reads like fiction, but stays loyal to the truth. Philip Gerard walks this fine line with confidence, style and utter zeal, looking at the world with a reporters unflinching eye and offering it up with all the skill of a master storyteller. With the same clarity and passion, Gerard offers instruction and advice to help aspiring and experienced writers create pieces so compelling, so engaging, that readers will never forget them.

Portable, accessible, affordable, and packed with engaging examples, Crafting Stories is a friendly introduction to writing short fiction. It encourages students to read fiction actively, with a writer’s eye, and to approach their own work in a spirit of adventure without sacrificing rigor. It makes the elements of story-craft more engaging to student readers, so that beginning writers can see greater progress reflected in their short stories over the course of a single semester.

Write authentic dialogue that invigorates your story! Exceptional dialogue isn't just important when writing fiction--it's essential. In order to impress an agent or editor and keep readers turning pages, you need to deliver truly standout dialogue in every scene. Crafting Dynamic Dialogue will give you the techniques and examples you need to impress your readers. This book is a comprehensive guide to writing compelling dialogue that rings true. Each section is packed with advice and instruction from best-selling authors and instructors like Nancy Kress, Elizabeth Sims, Steven James, Deborah Halverson, James Scott Bell, Donald Maass, Cheryl St. John, and many others. They'll show you how to: • Bend the rules to create a specific effect • Understand the role of dialogue in reader engagement • Use dialect and jargon effectively • Give every character a believable, unique voice • Set the pace and tone • Reveal specific character background details • Generate tension and suspense • Utilize internal dialogue Whether you're writing flash fiction, a short story, or a novel-length manuscript, Crafting Dynamic Dialogue will help you develop, write, and refine dialogue to keep your readers hooked.

A practical, encouraging guide to writing short fiction, with a diverse range of stories included.

A book that writers can turn to for the truly important aspects of writing a novel or script.

Craft matters. Point of view matters-its controlling effect often overlooked in the study of authors' rhetorical choices. This book showcases creative writing from students in the University of Vermont Honors College course, Crafting Point of View, that evolved through experimentation. These writers tackled stylistic imitations of novelists, memoirists, and poets who chose unconventional points of view in their prosaic and poetic story telling: the dialect and direct-address of Celie's letters to God in Alice Walker's The Color Purple; the masterful and inventive manipulation of multiple points of view, sometimes within the same chapter or paragraph, in Lydia Davis's Collected Stories-predominantly "Break It Down"-and Abigail Thomas's Safekeeping; the surreal seemingness of "How to Tell a True War Story" in Tim O'Brien's metafictional The Things They Carried; the ways for means that poets like Maya Angelou, Donald Hall, and Jane Kenyon shift points of view, sometimes to alter the lens on pain; and the utilization of that "say you are...," "imagine this," all-inclusive assumedness of the second-person in Jay McInernay's Bright Lights, Big City and Mark Richard's House of Prayer No. 2. In the explorations that follow each story, essay, poem, or media message, student reflections on the crafting process will enlighten readers about the power and purpose of this often-undervalued element of style in writing: point of view.

Crafting Poems and Stories is an inspiring new guide to creative writing. Comprehensive in its treatment of poetry and fiction, this book offers the features that students most often request, including concise definitions of basic terms of poetry and short fiction, focused discussion of craft, exciting literary models, and engaging hands-on exercises. It is an accessible guide that renders the material of introductory creative-writing courses more readily engaging, so that beginning writers can see greater progress reflected in their poems and short stories over the course of a single semester. Features: • Includes 60 poems and 9 complete stories, ranging from classic to contemporary • Each chapter includes craft-focused discussion questions and writing prompts and exercises • Includes appendices on workshopping poetry and fiction and on resources for writers seeking publication

Get all the tools you need to craft compelling creative nonfiction prose. This helpful guide gives you everything you need to write real-life characters, compelling plots, natural dialogue, and captivating details.

Write Moves is an invitation for the student to understand and experience creative writing in the larger frame of humanities education. The practical instruction offered comes in the form of “moves” or tactics for the apprentice writer to try. But the title also speaks to a core value of this project: that creative writing exists to move us. The book focuses on concise, human-voiced instruction in poetry, the short story, and the short creative nonfiction essay. Emphasis on short forms allows the beginning student to appreciate lessons in craft without being overwhelmed by lengthy model texts; diverse examples of these genres are offered in the anthology.