Customer Reviews

The Write Type: Discover Your True Writer's Identity and Create a Customized Writing Plan

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Committed or Conflicted? Organized or Chaotic? Lunch Hour or Log Cabin? What kind of writer is one, really? "The Write Type: Discover Your True Writer's Identity and Create a Customized Writing Plan" is a guide to help writers identify with who they are as a writer by going over preferred writing conditions such as mood, organization, deadlines, solitude, order, and other aspects of ones writing that may not be obvious to everyone. "The Write Type: Discover Your True Writer's Identity and Create a Customized Writing Plan" is highly recommended for any writer who can't seem to find the right groove or mood to really start cooking, and for community library shelves dedicated to writers. Also highly recommended from Adams Media in the subject, "Time to Write: No excuses. No distractions. No more blank pages" (9781598694383, $12.95) by Kelly L. Stone.

This is an excellent read, one of the best "on writing" books I encountered. It touches every bit of the internal debate a would-be author struggles with, such as finding the right time to write, should I publish, is writing in cafes versus a private room better for me, am I allowed (yes, much inner psychology there) to deal with more than one writing project at a time? with multiple exercises (I particularly loved the RET one) and true-life stories, this book helped me to achieve what so many others could not - finding what truly suites me as a writer, while breaking some of the "mainstream" myths for best writing out there. Kudos!

The subtitle of this book is 'discover your true writer's identity and create a customized writing plan'.

To do this, you need to do exercises: answer questions writing first with your dominant hand then with your non-dominant hand. They are the same questions. And with me they generated the same answers, phrased differently, sometimes a bit stronger with the one then the other.
There were also questions where you had to check off items which applied to you, again first with your dominant hand then with your non-dominant hand. I'm sure, this did not switch on the other part of my brain.
Then there are the 'internal dialogues' where your dominant hand states the problem, your non-dominant hand writes what is needed or what has caused it, and your dominant hand gives the solution. I drew a blank there.
I do think it could work in a way. I know the subconscious can provide answers and/or solutions, when consciously thinking you seem to have run out of options. But for me, it needs a bit more than just switching writing hands.
After three chapters, I got bored with the exercises and just read on.

There are some good tips in this book, and many of the subjects were food for thought, where, before, the decisions had been made subconsciously.
But this didn't make the book a 'keeper' for me.

I've just finished reading Karen E. Peterson's The Write Type. She is a Psychology Ph.D. and this short book shows it. To be fair, it's billed as a 'companion' to her previous book - Write, which I haven't yet read.

The Write Type is supposed to help you figure out...well...what type of writer you are. Some of the categories Peterson explores are whether you're an organized or a chaotic writer, whether you approach your writing sequentially or nonsequentially, and whether you like to write alone or at Starbucks.

To help you figure this out, Peterson provides the reader with a series of exercises. She uses a 'right brain' vice 'left brain' approach. For each exercise you will answer a set of questions, first with your 'dominant' hand, then with your 'nondominant' hand. This is supposed to help you think more fully with one side of your brain, or the other. She then tells us how she answered the same questions, and how she made compromises between what her left brain wanted, and what her right brain wanted. This turns out to be quite helpful, because at first, I had no idea how to approach these exercises.

Finally, after completing the book, you should be able to come up with a 'customized' approach to your writing. You should know what time of day is best for you, where you prefer to write, and how much to write.

Peterson has approached the writer's dilemma in a unique way. Personally, I found the exercises corny, and chose to skip them. I did read her responses to them, so I knew what she intended with them. I would recommend this book to anyone who is really conflicted. If you suffer from writers' block on a daily basis, then maybe you can get some relief from completing the exercises. If you don't have those kinds of issues, but simply want actual, "mechanical" writing advice...then skip this book.

This book is a complete waste. I would rather have the $[...] bucks I spent on it back. The idea that by switching hands your subconscious will just reveal things to you is more than a little silly. This book is pretty much just a bunch of baloney. Don't waste your time.

Yes, the right and left parts of the brain contribute different things to our thinking and acting. However, the author's premise that merely putting a pen or pencil in first the dominant and then the "nondominant" hand will somehow reveal totally different responses related to what might be my writing "type" is disingenuous at best. The author almost sounds like she is using a Ouija board, with each hand responding totally apart from her conscious thinking and even having conversations with each other.

Add to this the author's continuous attempts to remain non-judgmental and non-coercive; "and of course, give yourself permission to..." is the phrase that she uses at the end of almost every chapter, telling the readers they do not really have to do anything that she may have suggested.

I see nothing here to provide a "customized writing plan," nor any constructive guidance in helping writers write and would definitely recommend that no one waste either time or money on this very unhelpful and unnecessary book.

This book offers simplistic psychologically inspired suggestions to aspiring writers. Save your money; there are many better, more effective books on similar subjects on the market.