Customer Reviews

By Cunning and Craft: Sound Advice and Practical Wisdom for Fiction Writers

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This is one of the best books I've ever read on fiction writing. I think even for non-writers it would be a fun read. I'm an aspiring novelist and as I read this book I started sticking post-its on the pages with ideas and points to take straight to my writing. But I stopped doing that since almost every other page was getting a post it. Selgin's writing is rich and full of detail and makes you feel like you're hanging out with someone who's really excited about his subject -- writing fiction. Here's what he wrote about authentic details when writing description: "Think of those shots in movies when the camera lingers on a broken windowpane...or does a slow sweep of someone's dresser top, showing us the cufflinks a character wears, the brand of cigarettes he smokes, and how he treats loose change. These are authenticating details. Consider lingering on such details yourself, if only for a sentence or two." The "10 Lessons" are entertainingly documented and supported with lots of excerpts from established writers. One of my favorite parts is when Selgin dissects one of his own stories and takes you through his thinking and creative process. This book gives you great inspiration every time you pick it up.

The cover of By Cunning & Craft promises us "sound advice and practical wisdom for fiction writers." Author Peter Selgin makes good on this with a lively and insightful book that respects its readers' intelligence while offering clear, crisp guidance. With the opening Fitzgerald quote of "All good writing is swimming underwater and holding your breath," Selgin plunges right in. His style is both scholarly and playful (referencing The Wizard of Oz, James Joyce and Hamburger Helper within lines of each other) and never looses sight of its purpose. As clever and colorful as Selgin's presentation is, he is obviously respectful of his subject matter. The abundance and variety of his literary references keep things moving at a good clip and make for a fun journey. And, as all instructional books make claim to (but not all deliver) By Cunning & Craft leaves us feeling that we actually gained something of value along the way. Selgin knows his stuff. And, as a happy aside, the volume itself is a very nice physical specimen -- compact in size with a rather old-fashioned cover. Pleasant to hold and peruse.

This book is fun to read. Better than that, it will teach aspiring writers, practicing writers, and people who just love to read a lot about the machinery beneath a novel's surface that makes it go. The author shares his considerable wisdom about characters, point of view, structure, dialogue, description, style, and, most challinging of all, revision and publication. "Good dialogue isn't realistic," he warns; the author must control the release of information, he reveals, and "keep your notebook handy," he advises. This book's great charm and readability speak for itself.

I confess, I'm an addict of books on the craft of fiction-writing. Selgin's distinguishes itself by the way he lays his cards on the table from the very beginning. (And let's face it, writing of any kind is a personal pasttime.) First, Selgin tells us how he went from painting to writing almost accidentally, becoming "mesmerized" by the process. Even if you've been writing a long time, his meditations are helpful. A monk has to recite the same stuff over and over to himself, getting absorbed in the hidden mystical meaning of the words through the cadences, and a writer is a lonely old monk. From the beginning of this book, I was absorbed in Selgin's approach, and his testimony. My own particular creative-process sins gathered moral weight the further I read. I have known for a long time, for instance, that I overly control-freak the content and wording of my first drafts, to my own detriment. But as Selgin reminds us, first drafts are for us and not for the reader. "Don't edit," he advises, and he gives us good reasons for this philosophy and method. I also respect a writer advising on craft who has the courage to show us excerpts from his own writing. How many times have you taken a class in writing from someone whose work you knew nothing about, who didn't have the guts to show and tell? I give this book four stars and not five not because of the book's content, but only because the shelf of literature on creative writing already groans with the weight of the competition. Still, I place BY CUNNING AND BY CRAFT on that neat, brief shelf next to my other favorite texts on the subject, which I think are excellent indeed: Rust Hills's WRITING IN GENERAL AND THE SHORT STORY IN PARTICULAR (less about specific craft than general notions of what it's all about theoretically and how good writing goes to work on both reader and writer psychologically, from the POV of a seasoned Esquire fiction editor), and Jesse Lee Kercheval's BUILDING FICTION (great nuts and bolts, and also includes examples from her own published efforts). Selgin proceeds casually and informally by addressing holistically the writer's concerns, including all of those nagging questions about publishing. Instead of having us ask ourselves Why write?, he encourages us to ask, Why not?

THIS IS A BEAUTIFUL BOOK, outside, with its exquisite cover of the fox and the crow and its allusion to the slave who wrote, Aesop. Clarity could be added to the C's of the title, and, inside the covers, Consummate organization. Examples are well placed throughout the discusion of how to write so that transformation from draft to finished work is documented not merely explained. Above all we can feel the respect not only for this obsession of so many, but for the practitioners of the art in the face of that obsession. The intensity of wish is not dismissed but guided, surely, fearlessly, and without a trace of patronizing so common in books about how to write. Grace abounds, as does wit, and the writing itself is so cogent and fluent that it, too, becomes an example of the art it is trying to make possible for us to achieve. bravo! buy it! There are some b's. I could do an alphabet of Praise but it is time to stop.

I've read a handful of these kinds of books. Selgin's "By Cunning and Craft" stands out because he takes you through his own processes of writing. I found this to be more engaging and interesting than editors who write about other authors. Selgin takes you from a story's inception, which might just be an image in his brain, and walks you all the way to a polished story. He explains how he strengthens passages and finds a focus with his own stories.
This book provides lots of examples and he really DISSECTS what makes writing strong and what can weaken a sentence or paragraph. He avoided many of the cliches in fiction writing manuals. His style in this book is crisp and entertaining. The author clearly loves to teach writing and also loves the nuts and bolts of stringing together a great sentence. He also excerpts many of my favorite writers to illustrate their strengths in certain areas (dialogue, flashbacks, etc).
After I read this book I feel like I have strengthened my own critical eye for my own fiction writing. I'd highly recommend this book for anyone looking to hone their craft. I checked it out from the library, but I'm going to buy a copy.

Peter Selgin's BY CUNNING & CRAFT offers plenty for those interested in understanding fiction and how it is developed. The book is a pleasure to read, and it's beautifully bound. The cover and each chapter include a black-and-white illustration reminiscent of the old fairy tales.

The basis for the book (and its title) is summed up in the following excerpt from the introduction: ". . .if writing is an instinctive process, how can this or any book teach you how to write? Part of the answer is that instinct alone isn't enough. To produce a work of art, technique must also be brought to bear. When instinct and technique merge seamlessly, I call the result cunning. Cunning: skillful ingenuity in doing something."

By Cunning & Craft is organized with ten lessons, or chapters:
· People
· Point of View
· Structure and Plot
· Dialogue
· Description
· Scene, Summary, and Flashback
· Voice and Style
· Theme
· Revision
· Inspiration, Perspiration, Publication

The strongest chapters are those that deal with point of view, theme, voice, and style. For example, from the chapter on voice and style: "If style is a writer's personal aesthetic as reflected by her choice of themes and overall approach in presenting them, then voice is the particular tone adopted in telling a specific story."

But the chapters addressing plot and scene are disappointing. Fiction-writing modes were not adequately addressed. Maybe future editions of By Cunning & Craft will fill in some of the gaps.

Many of the examples offered throughout the text are of literary fiction and may fall flat for writers interested in other genres.

Although there are no exercises presented and no summaries at the end of the chapters, an index is provided for easy reference. Selgin also includes a bibliography of books on craft.

Ideally, a newly issued concept-to-publication text about how to write fiction should:
1. Adequately cover the basics of writing a novel
2. Discredit some of the misinformation about novel-writing that has been published in the past
3. Provide ground-breaking insight and guidance not already presented in the numerous how-to books that precede it
Although By Cunning & Craft offers valuable information on many of the subjects addressed, it falls short of achieving each of these benchmarks.

One of the keys to learning from how-to books is not to dwell too much on what is missing or misleading, but to focus on extracting whatever valuable information is there. Most how-to books offer nuggets of wisdom and technique that are well worth the effort of digging them out, and this book provides plenty. No doubt, readers and writer's of fiction will be studying and quoting from By Cunning & Craft for many years.

I had read an excerpt from this in Writer's Digest, and was happy to find this available as an e book. I read it on a flight coming back from Tucson after a vacation. The book made me eager to do some revision on my (wretched) novel draft. Peter Selgin offers sensible and realistic advice. I also reccomend his 179 Ways to Save a Novel: Matters of Vital Concern to Fiction Writers

It looks like a secret manual on an ancient art.
This was my first thought upon being handed this small volume, upon first running my hand across the intriguing matte cover, upon first reading those alluring words; By Cunning and Craft.

"When instinct and technique merge seamlessly, I call the result cunning." Selgin says, and he is certainly cunning himself. The first two pages drew me irrevocably into the books depths, which did not disappoint. The language was beautiful, the content inspiring. It was, by turns, rich and refreshing.
Chapter by chapter, the book covers writing basics:
-People
-Point of View
-Structure and Plot
-Dialogue
-Description
-Scene, Summary, and Flashback
-Voice and Style
-Theme
-Revision
-Inspiration, Perspiration, Publication
All subjects are treated to the kind of prose you want to read aloud, just for the delight of hearing it-- and it's as applicable as it is mellifluous.

Each page is a gold mine of quotes, from "But if fiction is a lie, it's a lie of special order, a lie that tells the truth." on the first page, to "The work is all that matters. Now sit down, and get to work." on the last.

I had not even considered my theme until I came to Selgin's chapter on it, which guided me to finding and strengthening the theme that already hummed through my work. His section on revision showed me how to figure out where my novel needed slicing and what could use a polish, while his opening words on first drafts made me want to start a whole new work right then!

By Cunning and Craft will grace any bookshelf, whether of a novice looking to gain cunning in their craft, a seasoned career writer looking for a delightful brush-up on basics, or simply a reader seeking an insightful secret manual on an ancient art.

Invaluable advice and tools for the budding and accomplished writer. I have to admit I highlighted nearly a quarter of the book for quick reference and I have promised myself to read it over and over and over, each and every time I begin writing a new story. Thank you, Peter, for your wit and wisdom!