The Creative Writing Handbook Book

With more films pouring out of Hollywood and more television stations sprouting up than a couch potato has had TV dinners, most people you talk to nowadays seem to have a film or television treatment bubbling away on their brain's back burner. If you are one of these hopeful cooks, then The Creative Writing Handbook is worth reading for its chapter on screenwriting alone. In fact, the book's range is so broad--from writing for film, stage and radio to short fiction, autobiography and experimental prose--that almost any developing writer will find their concerns addressed. (Different chapters are written by different professional writers and tutors, each an expert in that particular field.) Authors Meriel Lland and Robin Nelson tell you exactly how to lay out a film and television script--different rules apply--and explain the "plot-resolution writing model" favoured by successful writers (central character faces conflict to you and I). The catch? This conflict has to be resolved over the course of a 90 to 100 page screenplay. With each page equalling one minute of screen time, write any more and your precious script is likely to be binned by a "gofer" solely employed to burrow through a studio's slush pile. Other helpful chapters are those on writing for stage and radio and journalism. In the former, editor Mary Luckhurst drums home the importance of meaningful dialogue, in the latter, Luckhurst and Betty Princep set varied workshop tasks, from researching your readership and finding article angles, to writing a sports report. Indeed, one of the book's strengths is its workshop tie-ins at the end of each chapter, making it invaluable for anyone teaching creative writing at university or A-Level. So, if you do have the next Pulp Fiction simmering away in your imagination, stop dreaming and start cooking. --Amanda CameronRead More