I have never read a Stephen King novel before this one. I have never been big on horror for entertainment and have noticed a stronger aversion to it as I have aged. Life itself has provided me with more than ample horror. I have no desire to supplement it, but I figure that there has to be something about Stephen King’s writing, beyond the subject matter, that has made him so prolific. I really wanted to understand his methods.
This book is a very easy read. He starts it off with several stories about his childhood and upbringing. It is very captivating, but after a while, I was wondering when he was going to talk about writing. Stephen King believes that one should write what one knows about. This includes what may be learned from his or her upbringing. I began to understand his point and saw how I might apply this concept. He provides stories from early childhood all the way to when the book was written.
His writing style seems effortless, but he reveals the work he puts into it. He has methods for setting time aside (which mirrors a previous book I read – The War of Art) for writing. He outlines the type of setting he does his best work in and when to start marking up a first draft – it’s a strict six weeks after completion. No more, no less. He also urges the reader to read and write often – every day, in fact.
The only grammatical thing he really touches on is the adverb. He does not like adverbs and he feels that your reader will not like them either. My biggest takeaways from the book were to write what you know and provide just enough detail describing people and things to give the reader the ability to fill in everything else. His physique resembled a walrus in a tank top. The previous sentence is an example of being descriptive, but without burying the reader in details. Each reader will likely have a slightly different, but very vivid image of this unfortunate character’s appearance and won’t be bored with an overly detailed description. It helps to keeps the story moving.
This was a really good book. It is worth a read even if you have no intention of becoming a writer. I really appreciate that Stephen King took the time to do this. There are very few authors that have gained an audience as large as his, and even fewer that have given a glimpse as to how it was done. As time goes on, this may be looked at as one of his most important works. I am also happy to report that his methods should translate quite well to all fiction writing, not just horror. He just appears to be writing what he knows.