BOOK: The Heroine’s Journey (2020)

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The Heroine's JourneyYear: 2020Author: Gail CarrigerLength: 305 pages When I started writing over a decade ago, I subconsciously modeled my story structures off the stories that I enjoyed. I didn't go into my first novel with the plan to make it the typical "Hero's Journey," and the result was far from it. The stories I was writing seemed to work, even if they didn't abide by the known structure many authors had used before me. The problem was, I didn't have a name for the style of story I was writing. After reading Gail Carriger's book, The Heroine's Journey, I can finally label the stories I write. Carriger makes it clear that stories that follow the Heroine's Journey don't always have females in the lead role. Instead, the Heroine's Journey is the antithesis of the Hero's Journey. Where the Hero's Journey is about individual achievement and sacrifice, the Heroine's Journey is more about building community to tackle a problem larger than any...
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BOOK: Save the Cat! Writes a Novel (2018)

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Save the Cat! Writes a NovelYear: 2018Author: Jessica BrodyLength: 320 pages I had already written a dozen manuscripts by the time I read Save the Cat! Writes a Novel. Most of my plots had come fairly easily to me, but as a father, I now have less time to spend on planning novels. The plot of the last trilogy I drafted felt unfocused, so I knew I needed some way to re-structure my unedited and unwritten novels from here on out. When I asked my writer friend to suggest a few books to help me, she gave me this one to read. I am now a changed man. I had already heard of this book from a few other writers who use its method, but now I truly understand the appeal. Looking back on the books I had written, I was already using parts of the Save the Cat structure subconsciously. Fortunately, now that I had the full picture of this writing...
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