Tag: Quirk Books

Review: See Jane Write by Sarah Mlynowski and Farrin Jacobs.

Posted November 26, 2008 by Rowena in Reviews | 2 Comments

Grade: 4 out of 5

With chick lit novels popping up on every bestselling list, millions of readers are all thinking the same thing: I could write this stuff. I could write a bestseller and never go back to the office again! and here’s the guide that will show you how. Bestselling novelist Sarah Mlynowski and veteran chick lit editor Farrin Jacobs cover every stage of developing and selling your soon-to-be bestselling novel, with information on -developing an idea -deciding on a point of view -making your characters likeable -learning the basics of plotting, pacing and conflict -finding an agent -and much more, including humorous tips and advice from scores of established writers (from Meg Cabot and Marian Keyes to Emily Giffin and Sophie Kinsella). If you’ve got stories to tell, See Jane Write will take care of the rest!

I know that this book isn’t a romance novel or even a book but I’ve always reviewed all of the books that I’ve read and I wanted to keep up with that so because I read this book, I will be reviewing it…and now on with the review.

I like to write.

Will I ever become a published author? Meh, I don’t know but even if I never did it wouldn’t stop me from writing. I write because I just feel like it. But I wanted to get serious about writing a really good story so with the help of my awesome friends, they’ve gotten me some really great How To guidebooks and this was one of them.

So far, this is the prettiest book that I’ve read about writing. I’ve always thought about writing a chick lit book and I’m thinking that maybe I will after I’m done with the story that I’m writing now. This book had a lot of great advice for a young writer like myself (and I’m still young dammit) and I really enjoyed reading this book. It wasn’t filled to the brim with boring tid bits of what to do and what not to do. This book kept my attention and it gave me a lot of insight to what works for well established chick lit authors like Meg Cabot, Sophie Kinsella, Melissa Senate and you know, authors like that.

Writing is not an easy hobby and finishing a story takes a whole lot of dedication and this book helped me through some of the things that I struggle with in my own writing so I’m really glad that I read it. It was fast, fun and definitely insightful. What made this book great was that it was written by both a chick lit author and a successful chick lit editor so we got to see how things are done, what editors/pubs are looking for in a great chick lit book.

I really enjoyed the little “It Happened to Me” tid bits added by random authors and all of the little character sketches were a really big hit with me since I do something similiar to this and as a whole, this book was just a fun read, at the same time that it was very informational and got me inside the collective brains of some of my favorite chick lit authors.

I’m glad that I read this book and will look forward to seeing how things turn out for me. Should you read this? If you want to get serious about writing chick lit books then by all means, handle that scandal…this book helped me out some, so I’m sure it’ll help you out. It’s got a pretty cover and great font, so that was a big hit with me too!

This book is available from Quirk Books. You can buy it here.


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