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Summary: Like sitting down with a wonderful and witty friend.
Review: Anne Lamott loves writing and she loves writers. She tells you that she knows how pitiful and overwhelmed you feel, with your little insights and that great big piece of blank paper. But as her father told her brother, as he sat, the day before it was due, to start the huge research paper on birds he was supposed to have been working on for months, you just take it bird by bird, buddy. She reminds you why you write--not to validate your parking ticket, but to feel the pleasure of making your thoughts and experiences into words. She shares with you her own experiences and the words that have helped her. She quotes E.L. Doctorow as saying that writing is like headlights on a highway--you can go a long way, just lighting the little space in front of you. And she lights that space, to get you going. You'll also enjoy her earlier non-fiction book, Operating Instructions, about her son's first year, and her novels -- she is a pleasure to spend time with, and her advice applies to all aspec
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Summary: Writing the Great American Novel? Read this Book First!
Review: After Operating Instructions but before Crooked Little Heart, Lamott captures in Bird by Bird,the way it feels to "have arrived" without finding the anticipated "my life is now complete" realization. The context of the narrative in Bird by Bird is the writer's life, and Lamott writes in a manner so easy/enjoyable to read that one would be hard put to dispute her being the writer she aims to be. The subtext, if you wanted to overanalyze this book, is that the journey, here becoming a writer, is as, maybe more important, than the destination/goal: publication. Her easy to understand/less easy to practice Nike-like advice amounts to: Just Write It. Her advice stuck with me, although its been almost a year since I read her book and am now finally attempting to write something (this review) for ?publication...well Amazon's Customer Comment page is sort of/almost like publication. Anyway, Bird by Bird is a wonderful wonderful book-- which incidentally proves to be and an exceptional procrastination device especially if read before writing the Great American Novel.
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Summary: Not for the Self-Centered or Weak
Review: This book-on-writing is one of the best I have ever read. Lamott manages to be blatantly honest about your likelihood of getting published (something missing in most of these books, in my opinion), but encourages you to write all the same. That's the point to writing after all. I don't write because I want to see my name in print. I'd be weak and shallow if that's all I sought. I write because I have to, because I don't feel right when I'm not writing. This book should be a source of inspiration to any writer who loves writing.
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Summary: Ten stars, please. A classic in its own time
Review: Here's the thing: I KNOW Anne Lamott loves writing fiction, and she's helluv good at it. But I swear she's at her best when writing nonfiction. Afterall, it was Bird by Bird and Operating Instructions that put her over the top; then she followed up with Traveling Mercies. The quality and longevity of her fiction pale by comparison.
Bird by Bird is simply one of the three best books on the angst of writing and being a writer that's ever been written. The other two are Writing Down the Bones and S. King's On Writing. But the three books are very, very different. King's is actually pretty weird in spots, as he is, but for the most part it's all about philosophy. Natalie Goldberg's 'Bones' is very instructional and inspirational.
But Lamott! Oh, Annie's book is just as outrageously honest and funny and true and painful in the telling as it is in actuality to be a writer.
Wonderful, wonderful book; highest recommendation.
Read it.
If you're a writer, you'll get some advice from a master on how to cope with (or not) self-doubt, writer's block, and jealousy. But read it anyway, even if you're not the least bit interested in being a writer but just happen to like her other books; you won't be disappointed.
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Summary: Writer's Reality
Review: Ms. Lamott has truly captured the essence of the world of a creative writer. She truly expresses what it is to be a professional author. Her book is filled with anecdotes that are so truthful and real that the reader automatically relates to her comments and experiences. She has fully achieved one of her objectives in getting her prose to "ring true" to the reader. The author talks about how a person driven to be a writer can discipline themselves and develop a personal system to create work. Her book makes comments on all the common problems that writers experience, including such things as writer's block, plot and character development and mental static. Within all of this Ms. Lamott introduces a dose of reality, that could be seen as cynical, if she didn't have such a witty and personal way of relating it to the reader. The book is filled with instructive advice on writing and life and serves to draw the reader in to the author's life, by cathartically experiencing or re-experiencing one's own personal life events. Not only does Ms. Lamott give people a reason to write, but she also answers the question once and for all, can someone teach another how to write better work? Ms. Lamott proves that this is eminently possible with this book. All people interesting in a writing career or even an adjunct career as a writer would be well advised to read "Bird By Bird."
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Summary: Holy Grail? Secrets come from ordinary experiences.
Review: Writing can be magical -- to be a conduit of the voices, to be merely the typist, to get out of the way of your characters, and to see the story develope like a Polaroid. Anne Lamott's book is practical, entertaining, insightful, amusing, and right on. I'm reading it for about the third time along with Julia Cameron's "An Artist's Way". I'm just starting to accept that the important thing, as Lamott points out, is the process of writing not the product. This book is good for beginners but a reminder for us who write and put our poems, short stories, novels in boxes within boxes in file cabinets in the basement. Anne Lamott reminds us that writing is a very human activity. It is humbling and exhilerating. And when we feel so alone in the process, Anne Lamott reminds us we're not alone in the things we confront or experience in the process. Writing is messy . . . is art. The magic, the secrets of the art come from ordinary experiences in the process. So, holy grail? Everybody has their own experience in salvation. Anne Lamott just reminds us common people who have to write to remain sane that we're not alone.
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Summary: Maybe it's sacrilege but...
Review: I don't really care for this book. With all the hyperbole about it, I really expected it to be the Holy Grail of writing books. Instead, it's very heavily laden with metaphors where writing and related topics are compared to all manner of things: birds, trees, squirrels, babies... I found it tedious after a while. I've tried repeatedly to get through this book - even getting it on tape (and the author reads the entire thing in a monotone). I only found a couple of useful tidbits, but with so many other books on this subject that say the same things more concisely and directly (without the purple metaphors), this one just isn't worth it. If you really want to read it, check it out of the library instead.
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Summary: Not exactly universal
Review: I recognize that Lamott, unlike me, is a published author, so I hardly have the right to critique her methods. As an aspiring author, though (presumably the target market for this book), I think the fact that I found it irritating and unhelpful does have some significance for other perspective buyers. Someone once said that an author is someone for whom 'writing is more difficult than it is for other people.' I don't neccesarily agree with that, but Lamott obviously does. About half of the time, when she talks about writer's block or issues related to writer's block (how to start yourself on the path to a succesful work of fiction), she makes it sound like writing a decent paragraph on the first try is something that happens about as often as God cures you of blindness. She has all kinds of suggestions for how to essentially trick yourself into writing. I always assumed that being good at something meant that you could actually do it...again, I realize how singularly this is my opinion, but if writing fiction is that hard, maybe your talent is for something else. The other approximate half of the book consists of more practical advice about style, plot and character, a lot of which is practical, some of which tends toward the obvious. Its best feature is Lamott's comic style, which is really ingenious at times, but I would still say that this book is probably of more of interest to casual literature students than to people seriously considering a career as a novelist.
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Summary: Great Advice for Burgeoning Writers in America
Review: The writer's life isn't always glamorous, but there is usually never a dull moment(OK maybe a few). LaMott tells it like it is. I got this book from my sister Sarah, who knew I was writing my first book. It turned out to be one of my favorite books of all time. It was interesting to eavesdrop on different strategies she employed to keep her writing fresh and creative. The book was so well written, I felt like I was talking to a good friend. Well Done Anne!! Jeffrey McAndrew
author of "Our Brown Eyed Boy"
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Summary: nuts
Review: This woman is crazy...but she knows how to inspire creativity. If you need some encouragement and ideas about how to start writing and get over the small trials that come with writing..this book is for you. She is amazing. She is just also nuts:)
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