Rating: 
Summary: Got me started on my novel
Review: The best plug I can give this book is that it gave me the inspiration (courage?) to plunge ahead and start on my first novel. Before reading it, I never thought I could write anything as long as a novel, but I'm now on page 127. It may have taken me 18 months, but I'm still going...bird by bird. Thanks, Anne.
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Summary: Funny and Inspiring
Review: In her devastatingly honest, self-depricating, hilarious style, Anne Lamott delivers exactly what she has promised--advice on writing and life.Lamott tells us that getting published doesn't really change things the way many aspiring writers seem to believe it will--you may become a published author, but you're still you. Some of her most valuable advice is about dealing with perfectionism, which she wisely calls "The Enemy of the People." This inspiring, funny book is a must for writers struggling with discouragement or self-doubt.
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Summary: One of the funniest books I've ever read--
Review: --right up there with Lamott's "Operating Instructions." This book may not help you much if you're looking to improve your writing, but it may be the best book you'll ever find to help you get over your blocks and WRITE. Lamott has a gift for looking at the world and especially herself with meticulous and embarrassing honesty and finally loving and accepting what she sees. Readers who are into Zen or a similar spiritual practice will find inspiration here for their practice as well as their writing. (Also recommended for encouraging you in creative expression and befriending yourself: Julia Cameron's "The Artist's Way" and Natalie Goldberg's "Writing Down the Bones" and "Wild Mind.")
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Summary: Self-indlugent trash for the self-preocupied.
Review: If you are a writer haunted by self-doubt and keep battling the daemons that haunt your ego, this book might give you a couple of insights on how to start writing. There are some useful tidbits for the rest of us, but these are difficult to find, and force you to read the rest. You will find no guidance as to creating a better plot, or characters, as the chapter names would lead you to believe. I expected a book like "Structuring Your Novel: From Basic Idea to Finished Manuscript" from Meredith and Fitzgerald, but with a personal spin. But instead I got some new-age drivel. Its nice to see that the author found solace and escape in her writing (and if you believe the description of the accompanying video, other things), but I wished she would have given us more of a book on writing then one on her personal pains.
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Summary: Funny, inspiring, & wise--but get your craft elsewhere
Review: If there's a better book to read when you're doubting yourselfand your writing ability, I don't know what it is. IF YOU WANT TOWRITE by Brenda Ueland may be more profound, but it's not as funny... I don't think Lamott copied Ueland at all. Both books are wonders, Ueland's more spiritual or mystical--i.e. how to express your own unique self and write your truth--and Lamott's more worldy--how to get your rear in gear and start producing copy. Lamott's chapter on crumby first drafts lets you know you must start somewhere and can't do that if you're constantly criticizng and editing yourself. And she is so right--once you have a beginning, you can make it better..and better...and better. She doesn't really tell you how to do that in very specific terms, but for that there's great sourcebooks like SELF EDITING FOR FICTON WRITERS and ON WRITING WELL, which more than cover the job. Bird by Bird may be short on craft, but it's long on motivation, humor, and practical ways to get yourself writing.
Rating: 
Summary: Listen to your broccoli
Review: I've read a number of other books on this subject, and none of them comes close to this one in wit and enlightenment. Not that I profess to be a writer, but I do believe that it is one of the hardest, lonliest, and most punishing of professions. Ms. Lamott's honest yet encouraging depiction of the travails of anyone crazy enough to try his/her hand at this, ALMOST makes ME feel crazy enough ... A bonus is her eloquent musings on the-meaning-of-it-all, equal to the efforts of famous philosophers.
Rating:
Summary: funny, useful, recommended
Review: A charming and often funny book on just what it says, writing and life. "Bird by bird" could be used as a philosophy for managing a lot of things....Anne for President!
Rating: 
Summary: Fun and impractical
Review: Anne Lamott is real, loveable, funny and honest, and this book will make most creative writers feel better about their own idiosyncracies and insecurities, but the actual advice on writing as craft could probably have been reduced to two pages. Buy it for entertainment and good company, not as a how-to book.
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Summary: BEST WRITING ADVICE I'VE EVER ENCOUNTERED!
Review: My copy of "Bird by Bird" is so underlined, highlighed and dog-eared that I may have to get a spare copy so I can start all over again. The most honest, down-to-earth book about writing I've ever read---and I've read them all. There's not a pretentious bone in Anne Lamott's body--what you see is what you get with her! I love what she said on page 102 about paying attention: "To be engrossed by something outside ourselves is a powerful antidote for the rational mind, the mind that so frequently()---seeing things in such a narrow and darkly narcissistic what that it presents a colo-rectal theology, offering hope to no one." The entire book is quotable! You come away feeling as if you've found a funky, new friend who you can't wait to visit again. I highly recommend all of her books. Not one of them has ever disappointed me!
Rating: 
Summary: A Rehash of Another Author's Book
Review: I can't believe that no one else has recognized that Bird by Bird is nothing but a rehash of Brenda Ueland's book, If You Want to Write--A Book about Art, Independence and Spirit. Only Ms. Ueland did it so much better--back in the 1930's. The original author teaches us how to write--without all the self-serving rhetoric of the copycat. Grab a copy of If You Want to Write--get the real McCoy.
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