My biggest challenge as a fiction writer is plot and conflict. I’m capable of writing dozens of pages where nothing really happens, or where everything worth mentioning is internal. Some people do this well. When I do it, though, it’s boring.

This book was like having a great teacher and mentor hold my hand while I planned my novel. I haven’t yet written the novel I planned using this book, but I feel sure that it will be immensely better than it would’ve been without it. Later on, I want to revise my first novel using his methods.

I will never again try to write without this book close at hand!