I first read this book several years ago, a half a year or so after I was privileged to attend a Writer's Conference at which Mr. McCann was one of the keynote speakers and a lecturer in two of the workshops I took that weekend. I enjoyed it then but did not appreciate it as much as I do now, with some distance, because many of the pieces of advice were tidbits I had only recently jotted down in my notebook from the conference and they did not seem so remarkable.

With a little distance, I can now more clearly see the beauty in Mr. McCann's writing and the value in his advice. How could you not be in love with writing that begins a chapter: "Be a camera. 'Language' us into vision. Make us feel as if we are there. Colors, sounds, sights. Bring us to the pulse of the moment."? As a long-time writer (although my writing has usually been the service of one job or another, which for the past 24 years has been as a lawyer and before that, a newspaper reporter), I have often read writing magazines, books, and articles to help me improve my writing, and some advice was just plain terrible, but much of it was helpful. Mr. McCann reminds us to "go into" ourselves, borrowing a phrase from poet Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, but also to look outward for inspiration. He also reminded readers that even though we should listen to and value advice from successful writers, we still must be true to ourselves, there is no single path to success, and if we don't actually sit down and write what is our own, we will never succeed.

This is a book that I must pick up again and again, to enjoy the language and to spark my creativity. There is still an unwritten novel or two in me and reading this book anew has lit that fire in me again. I am now going to keep it near my computer whenever I feel stuck or in just in need of reading some beautiful language. ( )

Very quick review on this short book packed full of advice and wisdom. McCann presents 52 letters of no more than a few pages, some only three words in fact, filled with wisdoms he has cobbled together over his lifetime as a writer.

Some great stuff here. I feel like you could take a chapter at a time as a prompt to go and work on that particular piece of advice.

I would love to see this in audio form as I think it would be very inspiring to anyone with creative persuasions.

A quick, punchy collection of micro-essays filled with helpful, thought provoking advice for writers. I found myself nodding with appreciation for virtually every piece of hard-won wisdom McCann shares in this gem of a book.

Some key takeaways:

Write towards what you don’t know.

Language is more important than plot.

To write well, you must be a voracious reader.

Spare those in your life the indignity of writing them so directly into your fiction. Give them grace and write away from them so directly.

You must write. Fail. Write again. Don’t be afraid of the grind required. Do the work.

More to come.

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I found this book online after picking up McCann’s short story collection “Thirteen Ways of Looking” and recognizing the author.

( )

De la mano de Colum McCann, ganador del National Book Award y profesor de escritura creativa en Nueva York, llega el perfecto regalo para los amantes de los libros. De una forma fascinante y motivacional, este libro es una llamada a mirar el mundo con ojos de escritor. Una oda al poder del lenguaje, un testimonio tan feroz como honesto de las marcas que deja la escritura como profesión, una invitación a los aspirantes a escritores a aprender las reglas pero también a romperlas. Estos 50 ensayos son, en última instancia, un desafío y un estímulo para que una nueva generación de escritores encuentre algo de verdad y de luz en el
oscuro mundo del arte. ( )

De la mano de Colum McCann, ganador del National Book Award y profesor de escritura creativa en Nueva York, llega el perfecto regalo para los amantes de los libros. De una forma fascinante y motivacional, este libro es una llamada a mirar el mundo con ojos de escritor. Una oda al poder del lenguaje, un testimonio tan feroz como honesto de las marcas que deja la escritura como profesión, una invitación a los aspirantes a escritores a aprender las reglas pero también a romperlas. Estos 50 ensayos son, en última instancia, un desafío y un estímulo para que una nueva generación de escritores encuentre algo de verdad y de luz en el
oscuro mundo del arte.