As many others, I have found that my love of reading has flourished into a want to write. I love putting my pen to the page and spinning a story from my imagination. However, as a young writer, my love of writing is not enough to get me published. I need skill, and for my skills to develop, I need guidance.
It is not often that you find a book that is not only funny and inspirational, but also honest. By all means, Anne Lamott has created one! Beautifully written and amusing, Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life is a touching and honest book that gives good, raw advice to aspiring writers.
From chapter to chapter, Lamott dishes out useful writing instruction and spices each with humorous anecdotes. She tells of how difficult it was to start writing, and each struggle she goes through to publish a new story. There are stories about her third grade lunchroom, her son, and her crazy friends. In Bird by Bird, there is a chapter entitled Broccoli and a chapter entitled Plot. Bird by Bird, although a slender book, is wonderfully broad in its content.
I especially liked the honesty of this book. There are authors and books out there that may tell me that I will get published in an instant, but I'd rather hear the truth. Lamott describes how hard it is to get published, but why you should continue to write through the difficulty of it all. She explains that it is no easy feat to write an entire book, much less a book that will sell well. Her candor was both funny and truthful, an uncommon combination, and her writing style was fluid and well organized.
I recommend this book for all young writers, and I would rate it a 9.9 on a 10-point scale. Although it is a nonfiction book, it is nonetheless captivating, and I stayed up terribly late to finish it!
