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#2290 -
This issue features a review of the book
The Way of Story: The Craft and Soul of Writing, by
Cathrine Ann Jones.
The Way of Story: The Craft and Soul
of Writing, by Cathrine Ann Jones.
Get an inside look at Amazon.com: http://snipurl.com/ip49
Cathrine Ann Jones gets to the heart of
writing a story. The book's emphasis is on knowing who you are.
Jones tells about her personal experiences in the world of
writing and writers and this contributes a texture of
behind-the-scenes humanness. She has included
"everything" she knows, appreciates, and understands
about writing stories. She gives it up. She reaches way back
for the stuff of this book. In writing her book that
way, Jones demonstrates what is required of the writer:
giving it up, putting it all out there, reaching way back. Here
is an excerpt from her book that shows the kind of commitment and
the work ethic a writer requires:
"I learned that the
There are varied and in-depth story
analyses, scores of quotations, and the practical core of the
book is made up of over twenty useful and challenging exercises.
The exercises bring this book into the category of a college
textbook. The exercises begin with basic ones intended to inspire
the process of writing. They progress to consider
story outline, then theme, plot, character, dialogue,
conflict. Techniques for imagery, channelling, and personal myth
writing encourage the reader to reach way back and then to
put it all out there, to put it into the story.
At the same time one also has to go with the
flow and just be. Jones writes:
"I had not been working in
"A few weeks later, during my annual
spiritual retreat in
"In case you haven't guessed by now, I
believe in destiny. One can either work with it or fight it.
Having done both, i would recommend tuning in, listening, then
following the path of least resistance, already there."
The Way of Story is intimate, inspirational,
useful, and educational.
~ ~ ~
That's the review. I do want to make an
additional comment in this separate section. To have
included it in the above brief review would have made for a
disproportionality in terms of what is normally covered in
a book review.
This book, like almost all others that are
published by very small publishing concerns, lacks an index. How
much more valuable this book would be with an index. I'd be able
to see all the mentions of Star Wars in one place. I'd be able to
glance at all the hundred or so names of people mentioned in this
book. I'd become aware of all discussions of character,
creativity, and theme, and every other concept. Under the main
heading of "Exercises" I'd be able to see sub-headings
stating in a few words the subject of each exercise and the pages
on which each occurs.
I'd see all the movie titles and where they
are noted within the book. In other words, I'd have a sense of
the aboutness of the book that is more like a rich oil painting
compared the water color table of contents that any book
offers. How else would I know at a glance that Dylan Thomas
is mentioned on pages 56 and 166? Or the exact pages where
Jung is mentioned or quoted, and they are several. Where did
I see that reference to Jodie Foster's Clarice and that
quotation from Hannibal Lechter? Darn. If there were a
good index I'd know immediately that Clarice appears on
page 77, and I'd gain that information whether I looked up
"Foster, Jodie", "Clarice", "Silence of
the Lambs", or "Hannibal Lechter" (not
"Lechter, Hannibal" because who the heck would look
under "Lechter"?). How about something like
the following as part of an index:
personal experiences of author
Cool
Hand Luke, opening written as stage directions, 73-74
E.M.
Forster, why he stopped writing, 22
Julie
Harris, as lead in author's screenplay, 15
Lee
Strasburg, taking his class, 145
Peter Brook,
discussion of
etc.
Would that kind of thing be
useful? Would it add to the already rich texture of the
book? Does it create interest? Could a good index be a selling
point to individuals, college teachers, and libraries?
My comments about the index, though
specific, really apply to all the books that people are
publishing. I don't mean to pick on Cathrine Ann's book. As I
write book reviews from now on, I'm going to be reviewing
their indexes. If there is none I'm going to show how an
index would be valuable, if in fact one would.
Two of my pet peeves are poor or lacking
indexes, and fictional works written by spiritual teachers. Index
or no index, if every spiritual teacher -- or anyone with
literary ambitions -- reads and practices The Way of Story,
they would likely be more successful.
~ ~ ~
The Way of Story: The Craft and Soul
of Writing, by Cathrine Ann Jones.