Find comedy & joke books at Amazon.Com Books For Writers: Find comedy & stand-up CDs at CD now.

Comedian's Library

Actor's Library

Musician's Library

Writer's Library

Painter's Library

Dancer's Library

Magician's Library

Public Speakers

Juggler's Library

The Writer's Library:

Search:
Keywords:
In Association with Amazon.com

     Books on writing are important because that's what TV and movies tend to lack today. Before you can integrate the special effects and create the images that you really want, you need a good story. Here are some tools that will help you create one.
     These references include where to buy and sell you work. In addition, they also include examples of classic literature that can teach you by example.

1.) Fiction Reference Books

     Fiction is all about writing about things that never really happened. This is important for entertainers, because most of the stories we write, we make up. Believe it of not, learning how to write better stuff, can make you a better performer. Not to mention, if you get a job as a writer, you could actually outshine the other writers on TV. Just look at Saturday Night Live.

Writing Poetry

     Why would I want to learn about poetry? Poets are the masters of saying as much as possible with as few words as possible. Most of the best writers, poets or not, have their writing described as poetic at times. Therefore, poetry is definitely worth reading about.

Writing Fiction: General

     These are books that talk about writing fiction in general. They focus on the mistakes people make and all the other attributes that encompass great fiction: characters, plot, setting, climax (nothing to do with sex), and resolution. Consider these books all-in-one text books.

Writing Fiction: Novels

     The next few books are more specifically meant to help you write the all-American novel. Of those that I've read, How To Write A Damn Good Novel contains some great original ideas that could easily make your ideas a little more crisp and original than the average novel received by typical publishers.

Writing Fiction: Types

     Fiction is broken into several categories. There's horror, mystery, suspense, science fiction, romance, and fantasy, just to name a few. There are several books meant to help you with just the category you intend to write about. Here are just a few of those books.

Writing: Characters

     Characters have been described as the most important attribute in any novel. It is said a novel with no plot and interesting characters will outsell a novel with a great plot and characters as boring as hell. That's because it's the people in a story that we relate to. In any case, ignore the message Hollywood has sent you, good characters are important. Use these guides to help develop them.

Writing Fiction: Setting

Writing Fiction: Plot

     The fact that good characters are more important than a good plot, doesn't mean you should ignore a plot all together. After all, those books with a combination of a plot full of twists and turns and interesting characters we've never met before, are probably the books that will sell the best, and become classics in the long run.

Writing Short Stories

     These books are all about writing short fiction. Unlike novels, short fiction has to make every word count. Somewhere in between poetry and the novel lies these pieces of work. You have much fewer words to get your point across. You also have to get to the point quickly, without making the ending seem forced or abrupt.

2.) Nonfiction Reference Books

     Books nonfiction is also important. A lot of movies are derived from actual events. In order play parts in these movies, or just to talk about real events in your life, it really helps to know how authors can use words to make what was once mundane, interesting.

Writing Book Proposals

     A book proposal is simply a letter stating why you think a book is a good idea. These are mostly great for non fiction, if you can come up with the reasons the book should be published: i.e. statistics about the people who would need and buy the book.

Writing Nonfiction

     These are general references that will help you write about the things that have happened. They focus on both specific types of nonfiction, and nonfiction in general. These books would be helpful if you want to write an autobiography or write about someone else's life. They would also help you write about exotic travels or help publish a scientific paper (not that the latter would make an interesting movie.)

General

Biographies/ Autobiographies

History Pieces

Types Of Nonfiction/ Travel

Business Letters

Technical Papers

Writing Journalism Style

     Journalism is the art of the inverted pyramid. That means all the important information is moved to the front. This allows editors the option of cutting from the bottom without reading the actual story, because journalist are lazy. I know I majored in journalism. Practically, these books could help you in writing documentaries and period pieces.

3.) General Reference Books

     These books are the meat of the writing industry. They tell you where to get the things you write published. They also will tell you how. Writers Digest and LMP, Literary Market Place, are the two most important books in this list. They're both highly recommended for want-to-be writers. Writers market is the best and cheapest source for writers. It not only contains great tips on the market place, but also 100s of tips on writing in general.

Buying/ Selling Stories

     Buying and selling is the meat of any industry. Believe it or not, the books you buy from Amazon through these libraries help keep this site on line. That's because, nobody goes into business to loose money. That's reality. So here are some books to help you buy and sell what you write.

Editing Your Work

     Ediiting your work is important. Thank god for spell checkers, or I would probably never have a prayer. Here are some books that will help you with grammar, punctuation, spelling, and all the other little things that could kill your idea before any publisher gives it a chance.

Other Reference Tools

     As much as you need to know how to buy and sell your work, you also need to know where. These books will tell you where to sell your short stories, novels, poems and help you find literary agents. Beware, the business is filled with scandals. These are publishers who will offer to buy four poems or stories from you, in return, all you have to do is buy four copies of their $100 book, available only in the Harvard Library (I imagine because the Harvard Library caries everything.) Any business is about you getting paid for your work, not ripped off by con artist. Be aware that they are out there, and will begin contacting you, as soon as you start submitting your work.

Literary Agents

Copyright Laws

Market Directories

[Comedy Groups] [Joke Links] [Business of Comedy]
[Comedy Clubs] [Comics] [Comedy TV] [Radio Prep] [Comedy FAQ] [Use Net]
[The Library] [Comic Tools] [Improv Comedy] [Comedy Classes]