A Writer's Book of Days: A Spirited Companion and Lively Muse for the Writing Life [Paperback]

Judy Reeves (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1999 | ISBN-10: 1577311000 | ISBN-13: 978-1577311003

Playwright and editor Judy Reeves has taught writing, led creative writing workshops, and participated in writing groups for years. A Writer’s Book of Days is a compilation of all that she’s learned from getting together to write with other people. She says, “the book came about because I saw the difference ongoing, regular practice could make in a writer’s life.” Practice makes perfect, and this book makes practice easy by providing writers and would-be writers with stimulating topics, helpful instruction, monthly guidelines, dozens of inspiring quotes, writerly lore, and tips for special writing sessions such as marathons, cafe writing, and other ways to make the work of writing more creative and fun.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Musicians practice. Athletes practice. And so, too, argues Judy Reeves, should writers practice. Her Writer's Book of Days provides a "writing prompt" for each day of the year, and then some: "Write about a time someone said yes"; "Write about leaving"; "Something seemed different." The more you practice, says Reeves, the more you write. And writing from a prompt, she adds, is like having "someone provid[e] the music when you want to dance." The prompts are the backbone of this book, but its pages are fleshed out with advice, inspiration, quotations from writers, encouragement, and a profusion of literary tidbits. Write from the sense, Reeves recommends. Audition words. Take risks. And when all else fails, amuse yourself with these astonishing tidbits from literary lives: T.S. Eliot, we learn, preferred writing with a head cold; Flaubert kept his lover's slippers and mittens in his desk drawer; and Friedrich von Schiller liked to invoke his muse by sniffing rotten apples. --Jane Steinberg

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: New World Library (November 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1577311000
• ISBN-13: 978-1577311003
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 7.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (50 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #811,779 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

49 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars get that pen moving, November 23, 1999

By 

Gwendolen Gross "author of THE ORPHAN SISTER" (NJ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Writer's Book of Days: A Spirited Companion and Lively Muse for the Writing Life (Paperback)

If anything will get you writing, this book will. Enough prompts to get even the most reluctant practicer going--much more fun that playing scales. This book provides companionship and direction, not to mention diversion in the form of lives of the writers information for when you need a word snack before you start your own work. As a writing teacher, I have all my students buy Judy's book.

42 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I Couldn't Keep From Writing..., December 8, 1999

By 

Karen Hertzberg (Oconomowoc, WI United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Writer's Book of Days: A Spirited Companion and Lively Muse for the Writing Life (Paperback)

Judy Reeves has written a gem of a book--one that actually got me writing in a matter of minutes.

I've been so busy with my writing web community that I told myself I wasn't going to look at my review copy of A Writer's Book of Days until after the first of the year. But once the book was in hand, I couldn't help but thumb through the pages. The stunning design and functional format hooked me immediately. Pretty soon I was reading--and the next thing you know, I was writing on one of the daily writing prompts the book offers. Imagine that--WRITING! I haven't had time for writing--just for the pleasure of it--in months. I've been writing three or more "practice pages" a day ever since, and loving every minute of it.

A Writer's Book of Days is a wonderful motivational tool, but it's also a delicious book full of advice that will, quite simply, make you feel like writing. Reeves encourages practice writing, and includes a year's worth of "writing prompts" designed to jump-start the creative process. But don't dismiss this book as another new-agey volume on freewriting. It's as practical as it is motivational. Reeves' writing is personable and honest. Her book makes you feel as though you're sipping coffee with your favorite writing buddy, talking shop.

I'll be offering my highest recommendation on the Coffeehouse for Writers website!

27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Fills A Void, June 26, 2000

By 

B. Schenck (Mississippi River) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Writer's Book of Days: A Spirited Companion and Lively Muse for the Writing Life (Paperback)

There are a lot of how-to writers' books around, but Judy Reeves's WRITER'S BOOK OF DAYS fills a void because it gives writers food for thought and starting points from which to work, either doing "practice" pieces or "timed writings" or taking her daily suggestions and going with them wherever the writer wishes. I found it useful and inspiring on these counts.

There are, however, a few things that bother me. The first is the insistence than this practice writing be done "by hand." I know there are a lot of writers who feel that the hand-brain connection is almost sacrosanct and that to write this way is like "breathing" and so on. But I think to insist that that is the only way it should be done is likely to cause some people to turn off entirely, to say, "Well, I just won't bother," because the physical act of writing is difficult for them. They will lose out on the valuable things this book offers because they can't fulfill one of the dictums the author seems to require. My own experience as a writer is that I'm just as connected via computer to my thoughts as I am when I handwrite them. In fact, I have a lifetime of painful memories of handwriting and do as little of it as possible. As a published writer, I know that I can write using computer and that doing so doesn't lessen the connection between my heart and my words, I wish Ms. Reeves hadn't made such a point of that being the only way to do such writing practice.

I wish, too, that she had not found it necessary to take a cheap shot at the romance genre. She doesn't take cheap shots at science fiction or westerns. I'm sure there are many people interested in writing romance who will find her flippant dismissal of the genre as "bodice-ripping, heavy breathing purple prose" both an unwarranted stereotype and an unnecessary condescension.

I had intended to buy a copy of this book to give to a romance writing friend of mine, but now I've changed my mind. I'm also reluctant to suggest it to a romance writers' group because no one likes to feel they are being taught by someone who disparages the area in which they choose to work.