Writing the Blockbuster Novel

Rating:
Summary: Some sound advice, but too windy
Review: Writing the Blockbuster Novel is too long by about 20 percent. I don't mean that it's a big book - at 224 pages, it's not. It's just that much of the book is taken up with full length examples of how Follett (and others) edited their manuscripts and how the story develops through that editing. I know this is valuable information, but it could have been abbreviated and made more readable.
There are certainly some useful tips in this book (though the same tips come to light in many other similar titles), and I think Zuckerman places too much emphasis on giving the novels a global setting - choosing topics and storylines that have global effects. But you only have to read Wilbur Smith to understand that a blockbuster novel does not have to concern world affairs.
The one really useful piece of information I gleaned out of Writing the Blockbuster Novel was to keep everything in present tense - even flashbacks - because it gives better pace to the story. For that advice alone, I'm grateful I bought this book, but I still believe I'm being uncharacteristically generous in giving it three stars.