|
||||||||||
|
Subscribe to the Absolute Write Newsletter and get the Agents! Agents! Agents! report free! Click here.
|
Win a 1-year subscription to Writer's Digest by subscribing to Absolute Markets-- all paying markets for your writing. Click here. |
|
| |||||||||||||
|
|
Inside the Cover Book Review Review by Brandy Y. Foster
How to Write a Successful Book Proposal in 8 Days or Less By Patricia Fry Matilija Press 2005 72 pp. $12.99 Writing-related
Patricia Fry's How to Write a Successful Book Proposal in 8 Days or Less was written for the novice writer. Fry aims to guide the writer who has a story to tell and little knowledge on how to present the story to publishers. The book chapters, components of what Fry thinks make a solid book proposal, mimic lessons from an eight-week online course she taught last year.
Outside of finding nuggets of valuable information and developing a spark of urgency to begin the writing process, which will come only if the reader focuses on the content of the book and reads it in its entirety, novice writers cannot expect much more from this book. Glaring grammar and writing mistakes call Fry's expertise on how to write a book proposal into question. Inconsistencies in writing ideas, weak statistics and examples, and the redundant rantings of advice strung together using as many words as possible might also leave an overwhelming number of writers frustrated and unwilling to finish reading the book.
Fry's book is not a must read for the experienced writer or editor. In addition to the mistakes mentioned above, most of the information presented in the book can be found online or in the library with a little research. Because Fry has authored 23 previous books, the experienced writer and editor will be irritated by the obvious lack of editing of the book, especially if they notice the entire paragraphs of information that are repeated, word for word, on consecutive pages.
Writers who decide to read this book for themselves should focus on the information given instead of the presentation of the information, if they can, and learn from the main ideas of the book. The underlying theme of the book stems from Fry's suggestion that writers should plan and outline ideas they would like to cover in a book that they expect a financial reward from. This theme is accurate and any writer can use Fry's chapter assignments as a starting point to developing solid book ideas. Through How to Write a Successful Book Proposal in 8 Days or Less, Fry shows that a book proposal can be written in eight days or less-- but the success of the book proposal will be determined by the writer.
Brandy Y. Foster is a professional writer, reporter, and assistant editor for a
Texas newspaper, editor of YouthConnection newsletter, and a staff editor and
reader for the Writer’s Village University website. Her recent achievements
include published recognition of her editorial work on two recently published
books, Pumping Your Muse by Donna Sundblad and Death at Dragonthroat
by Teel James Glenn, and numerous article recognitions through University
Wire.
|
Sponsored links 
Make a Real Living as a Freelance Writer! How to find a book publisher |
Text on this site Copyright © 1998-2007
Absolute Write, all rights reserved.
|
