Customer Reviews

Stealing Fire from the Gods: A Dynamic New Story Model for Writers and Filmmakers

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1 star:		(4)

 

 

As a writer with work published in numerous national venues, such as OMNI, Success, Writer's Digest, Reader's Digest and more, it is a great pleasure to find, after 20 years of writing, such a great collection of stimulating, visionary, inspiring, yet at the same time immediately useful and practical ideas.

I thought I was buying a book on writing, on story structure concepts. Little did I know that I was going to discover, in addition to an extraordinary book on writing, a profound treatise on understanding being human. James Bonnet has written a book every psychologist should read.

Having already read and immensely enjoyed Robert McKee's Story Structure, Christopher Vogler's Writer's Journey and other books on writing, I was amazed by how much new and different material, really transcendent, creative, mind stretching, James Bonnet offers in his book.

When a story works, it produces magic-- taking you on a ride, pulling your heart strings, making you connect with and feel the emotions, adventures and thoughts of the main characters. This book gives you amazingly precise, insightful strategies for building stories that work, that go to the reader's heart and soul. The book uses an understanding of mythology and more important, of the creative unconscious-- of both the writer, reader or viewer. He takes the ideas of Joseph Campbell, Carl Jung and weaves them into what he calls a Golden Paradigm, which uses visual charts which make it much easier to begin to understand the multiple levels his concepts apply to.

I put off writing a review to this book. After all, how do you describe the substance you've stolen from the Gods? But I am grateful to him for the new energy and excitement I've discovered in my own writing. I can't wait till James Bonnet offers one of his storymaking workshops on the east coast, as well as the ones he's been doing in California.

An update: Since writing this review, I've read and perused numerous other books on story creation. This one still stands high on the list of must reads. I've put together a website about the Story conference I have organized-- StoryCon; The Art Science and Application of Story, at storyscience.com, where you can find a lot more information on who I think are the top experts in story creation. Most have written books you can find here on Amazon and some even have links directly to their books.

I just finished reading Stealing Fire from the Gods and have to say...what a wonderful book! I've been working on a screenplay for about 5 years now. I've written several drafts. With every draft I come a little closer to "the truth" but it's been a difficult journey. I've been too concerned with following the traditional 3-act paradigm, making sure the first plot point is around page 20, the second plot point on page...The emphasis on structure has inhibited and often paralyzed me. As a result I have produced mildly amusing, formulaic scripts. I'm proud of my efforts but not particularly proud of the final product. I always end up feeling empty and frustrated. My message has yet to be conveyed in a story.

Reading this book was a breath of fresh air. It spoke to me, the me deep inside. The me that has something important to say. The me that knows the truth. I haven't even begun to work again but I already have all these wonderful ideas bubbling to the surface. It's as if this book has awakened the true storyteller in me.

This book taught me a great deal about what makes stories powerful. But the biggest gift it has given me is the reminder to listen to my feelings. I'd gotten so bogged down in the rules of structure that I forgot to ask my heart what it required. It was my heart after all, that wanted to tell a story to begin with.

I re-read my latest draft last night and realize that the parts I like make me feel happy and excited. That sense of "rightness". And the parts that don't work have always made me feel ill at ease. They were cheap substitutes. They didn't come from an authentic place.

I also appreciate Jim Bonnet's thoughts on "keeping everything in a fluid state." That's precisely what I haven't been doing. I haven't allowed myself to play and explore enough before making creative decisions. I want to finish the script so badly that I sometimes settle for short cuts. And it's a funny thing, once you write a draft it's very hard to let go of it. The scenes I've written, the interactions, the plot, they become these seemingly solid constructs that even I the builder have a hell of a time tearing down.

Creating is a mystical experience and this book reminded me of that. With Bonnet's practical advise and gentle encouragement I know that I can now begin again and face a blank page with less fear and more wonder.

I am a screenwriting and first-time filmmaker. I have read almost every book on story to fine-tune my craft: I have read, Aristotle: Poetics, I have watched the video's on Joseph Campbell, I have read Chris Vogler's, Hero's Journey, I have read the screenwriting Gurus from Sid Field, Linda Segar, to Michael Hauge. Let me tell you...I have been searching for the secret...the one thing that makes a good story...that magic that captures one's emotions, the element that makes a story a legend in the mind and hearts of the people who see it. I thought I'd found it with Voglers, but his method seemed to apply only to a specific format centered around the Hero. This works with Wizard of Oz, Star Wars and Titantic but it didn't work with other stories. Then I stumbled upon "Stealing Fire from the Gods". James Bonnet's created a method called the Golden Paradigm "story wheel" It is unbelievable! It cracks the code to great story telling. His method is based on the key elements to telling a great story using the archetypal patterns that all of us go through in our journey through life. This was it! There is even a metaphysical relationship in his teachings as it relates to the human body and the energy centers/emotions/archetypes discussed in the Eastern Philosophies. James doesn't leave out anything! You can take any story, any film, and apply it to Bonnet's story wheel and crack it's story formula. Most people think this stuff is beyond a mortal's understanding- that it is only meant for the Gods to know. Out of all my books on my shelf, I feel like encasing this one in gold and putting on the top of my altar. It deserves worship. When you read this book you truly feel like you are stealing fire from the Gods. Thanks James for all your hard work and all the years you spent searching for immortality. I just hope the Gods aren't angry.

When I first started reading James Bonnet's book, I was excited. I had already read other works about the "Hero's Journey" approach to novel and screenplay writing. Bonnet was telling me that the hero's journey is only one small piece of something he called "The Golden Paradigm."

I kept expecting to find a closer explanation of the paradigm, for example how the hero's journey theme contrasted with other types of plots. So far I haven't seen anything like that.

For being a book for writers, this book is very poorly written (or poorly edited, I can't tell which). It reads like something that was self-published. The so-called explanations just ended up confusing me more than the original description did.

That said, I think Bonnet does manage to show that there are many different types of heroes, and their journeys may be very different. He also shows that some of the archetypes set out in the "Hero's Journey" approach can have positive and negative aspects, and most of them can be either male or female. I also like that he included quite a bit of information about the "anti-hero", or what Bonnet calls the "holdfast."

If you are willing to wade through voluminous and rambling prose to get at the main ideas, then I recommend this book. Otherwise, I suggest you get a synopsis from someone else. The ideas are good--the *book* is not.

Having read a great deal of Joseph Campbell's work on myth and the Hero's Journey and being in the process of writing a screenplay, I was greatly relieved to find Jim Bonnet's book Stealing Fire from the Gods. Here is a man who has taken the painstaking process of aligning all of the lessons of the mythic journey to our modern day rendition of the old storytellers, screenwriting.

In a step by step process, Jim lays out the process in such a way that a mental formula is created in one's mind as to how their individual story is tracking to the concepts and metaphors of the hero's journey. All done in a way that one can review their own work with a guidepost to track the progress with the power of the hero's journey.

But, do not take this warning lightly. Once you commit to working with this process, it does not stop once you finish the book. Having re-read the book multiple times now, I find it to be a slightly different and deeper read with each pass. Each pass through it opens a new cavern in the recesses of the process and the wisdom pores out like a flame from the torch in the inner recesses of the ancient wisdom. Venture forth with this in mind and enjoy the read and the journey!!!

I have just finished devouring this excellent book!! This is truly the "marvelous element" that we needed to make our new television series a huge success!

Although I am a much produced playwright, and my twice Equity produced musical of "Joan of Arc" is a completely realized mythic tale made relevant to our current culture, creating a TV series out of whole cloth is quite daunting. Add to this the fact that our heroes are wonderfully complex individuals on a quest to find the Truth behind spiritual and psychic phenomena, my co-writers (screenwriters of "Mulan") and I found ourselves overwhelmed. We needed a way to organize our thinking and our musings, and especially to focus. As one might suspect, the subject matter and the complexity of the heroes has created a crisis of abundance. Needless to say, there have been feelings of desperation linked to working this out. But then something wonderful happened. Like a gift from the gods someone told me about this book... just the day after we received notes from the producers containing questions that we couldn't readily answer.

I AM SO THANKFUL FOR THIS ELEGANT, INSIGHTFUL AND INCREDIBLY USEFUL GUIDE!!!

I only wish Mr. Bonnet had also written a book on creating a television series. We are able to apply most of this information... which is primarily making us ask all the right questions... but obviously the character and quest arcs on a TV series are much longer. And, of course, the trap there is to take too long on each phase of the heroic model. In this need, I emailed Mr. Bonnet, telling him my reactions to the book. He phoned me and expressed his sincere interest in this project, offering his services. We are all feeling enormously blessed thanks to James Bonnet!! I believe he is right about the desperate need for story in our world, and I wept reading the last page. It's all I ever wanted was to enlighten and to entertain. Now, with these insights, we have a shot at creating transcendent television. Imagine that!!

I am reading this book now and I think that it lives up to most of what people say about it. It is the most complete theory of story that I have seen but as such it also takes time to absorb. In fact, I can see spending a lot of time referring to this book as I read and write. There is one caveat from Jung however who cautions people against reductionist interpretations of symbolic language. Life is too complex to have only one model. With that in mind, this seems like a great place to start. If you're looking for a nice counterpoint to this book, one which reaches similar conclusions but does so in a way that is more subtle and elegant, check out King's On Writing.

I am an independent filmmaker and writer in the Bay Area, and I just recently finished Stealing Fire From the Gods.
Bonnet's work is absolute genius. I have always had this burning conviction inside myself as a writer to tell the TRUTH. To pull realism from the aspects I see in life and craft my characters to be real and true and human. I knew I had an even more important goal to achieve as a storyteller, but I couldn't put my finger on it. When watching films that had it, I of course could point it's quality out, but I did not know
how those film's invisibly touched me. Unlike most films, I related to these few somehow and "got" what the filmmaker's were trying to say in such a way that they moved me.
I read the first ten pages of Stealing Fire in a bookstore, and my jaw dropped..... This was it!!!! This is what I've been working toward in all my stories. This is the REAL truth. I've read the book now, and am so enlightened. No kidding, I would
pay thousands of dollars for the wisdom it's awakened inside me now. Bonnet has shown me how I always wanted to tell stories and gave me the easy ways to break them down into the blocks necessary to build them. The secrets to those movies I'd see that touched me, are no longer invisible and I understand them now.
I cannot thank him enough for how he has changed my writing, and my current script (which was missing something) just started to click for me, because I know where I am going now. I am no longer caught up in the glitsy sugar-coating-but-no-substance phase common in today's films, and am on the path to sharing my wisdom with my audience.
This book has taught me that to be a Great Writer, I need to teach my audience the ancient lessons I have learned in my life, and enlighten them as I would a friend. The Great Stories are how we've always shared this wisdom and how we evolve as humanity. Fascinating!!!!
If you read this, Thank you James Bonnet.

This book is such a miracle from the Lord himself that I have procalaimed myself a James Bonnet disciple (whether he knows it or not)!

James Bonnet makes his book easier to work with than a "Jarvis Method", funner than Voglers "Writers Journey", and even though I still feel that it's required reading for any writer or filmmaker, more appropriate to read than Campbells "Hero With a Thousand Faces".

James Bonnet needs to influence ALOT of people other than me with this book, for this book is truly the key for the better motion pictures and screenplays that we have been begging for since 1995.

This book tells the secrets to the most successful stories in DEPTH, and I just recently brought another copy of this book to bring with me to places and gets dirty(the other one stays home and is in great condition). Just this event should prove to you how important James Bonnet's knowledge is to me.

By the way, buy this book now!

Jim Bonnet does something no one else has been able to do -- he shows positively and comprehensively how the stories we enjoy as a culture fit into the larger picture of social responsibility.

While the politicos in Hollywood and Washington trade accusations and alabis about the role of this and that in movies and TV as they affect behavior in families and the streets, all those well-meaning but often clueless folks miss the big picture.

Bonnet doesn't miss anything. He sees with a studied and well- thought-through clarity how our very souls are starving for good stories, and also how we are close to spiritual starvation and dehydration for lack of nourishment from what the filmmakers, TV producers and novelists are turning out these days.

This may sound like pop sociology but it's very much to the point for anyone who writes or has anything else to do with bringing stories before the public. It is in fact the underlying substrate of nourishment in stories that feeds and waters our inner beings -- AND IT IS ALSO THE EXACT SAME QUALITIES AND ELEMENTS IN A STORY THAT SET CRITICS ABLAZE WITH PRAISE, AND THAT CREATE BOX-OFFICE BLOCKBUSTERS.

Not only does Bonnet make this argument coherently and believably for the first time anywhere, but he shows exactly how it has been done in the past, and he also shows how any writer willing to do the necessary inner creative exploration can create the kind of story that will have lasting impact both in reviews and in revenues.

I'm a professional writer who has spent 20 years shyly studying what Bonnet calls "storymaking." I've learned a lot and met some of the best teachers around. But I've never been as inspired or equipped to write my own stories as I have with what I learned from Bonnet.

Frankly, this book isn't for anyone. If you're looking for more clever knowledge or stunning scholarship in the realm of what makes a story, you'll probably be disappointed. Bonnet isn't flashy and he doesn't dazzle with his brilliance.

But brilliant he is. The key value of his work is for the thoughtful writer (and thoughtful others who are entertainment providers) who want to understand at last what made so many stories in the past truly great, lasting and impactful. Most stories today are thin and disappointing by comparison.

If you want to know how to write for modern audiences with the same impact that the great writers of yore did, then this book will tell you. It's not the easiest read but it is well written. And it contains information you simply won't find anywhere else -- if for no other reason than that no other successful working screenwriter and Hollywood actor has devoted 30 years of his life to studying, and then making plain, the eternal secrets of story.