How Not to Write a Novel (Recommendation)

Here's a book recommendation for anyone who wants to write stories:

How Not To Write A Novel by Sandra Newman and Howard Mittelmark.

I found this book when I finished reading Moon Over Soho, and browsed through the author's (Ben Aaronovitch) website, where he recommends it. And I have to say, it's brilliant. It's very much to the point, and the advice really makes sense. I got this book in March, read it over the course of three days, and highlighted the crap out of it, tbh. 80% of my Kindle Clippings come from this book, and every single one is worth it. I'm just rereading it now, as I'm starting with a new writing project, and there's still advice that I'm only discovering now, that I hadn't even noticed before.

Some of it feels like old news, like, don't write about your character doing nothing, or don't repeat scenes. But a lot of it is a real eye opener, and even that trivial-seeming advice is worded so cleverly that a) it's a delight reading it, and b) you feel like it was a good thing they reminded you again.

They have advice on all the various steps and aspects of writing – from plotting to characters to the final scene.

It's not super cheap, especially not for an ebook (the paperback costs the same), but it's definitely worth it. I've read a bunch of books on writing, and often found them fairly forgettable – even if they had good advice, I just can't remember it afterwards. But this sticks with you. If you're only going to buy a single book on writing, I'd seriously consider making it this one.

Shades of Something

I don't get the Fifty Shades of Grey craze. I'll be honest - I haven't read it, I won't read it, and I won't go to see the movie(s). It's not exactly my genre, and the excerpts I've read were enough to make me see that it's not my style either. I can't really switch off while reading, and I think that's what you have to do for these books.

What's undeniable though, obviously, is that they're very successful. I don't know why people read them, but they do. The amazon comments are mostly extreme praise, and not all of them are carelessly written either. So, yeah, people read them, and at least a couple of them are clever people as well.

Now, why I'm writing about this is - I was on amazon earlier looking at stuff and somehow came across a book titled

"A Million Shades of Green: The Real Story Behind Fifty Shades of Grey"

This is the description: 

A Million Shades of Green tells the story of how a novel-length piece of BDSM (Bondage, Domination, Sadism, Masochism) porn fan fiction called Master of the Universe (featuring Twilight characters Edward Cullen and Bella Swan) was secretly transformed into the #1 New York Times Bestseller, Fifty Shades of Grey, before being sold on for millions of dollars to one of America's most esteemed publishing imprints and a major movie studio.-------------------------------------------------From bestselling thriller writer Sean Black, the author of the Ryan Lock books, comes the real story behind the #1 transatlantic  'mommy porn' bestseller Fifty Shades of Grey.The tale of a spectacular literary heist, A Million Shades of Green, will take you on a journey into the hidden world of porn fan fiction, where books originally written for, and aggressively marketed towards children and teenagers by writers such as J.K. Rowling and Stephenie Meyer are given a violently pornographic twist before having their 'serial numbers filed off' and being sold on as original fiction.

 This sounds like it could be a very interesting psychological essay on the type of people who enjoy reading both YA fantasy literature and erotic fiction. People like those twimoms, for example. I think this is a topic that seriously needs to be approached from a neutral angle. It's no secret that YA fiction is about growing up, the confusion of puberty and being introduced into a completely new world with responsibilities etc etc. So why do grown ups read YA? Because it's in the perfect niche between excitement and freedom, and those responsibilities are still larger than ours and so make us feel good? I don't really know, but it's very fascinating. And then if you're part of the people who read YA even though they're not all that Y anymore and more A, what draws you to BDSM erotica? Is it really just the excitement of the taboo? I wish there were a good book on that topic.

A Million Shades of Green doesn't seem to be that, sadly. The cover is made up to resemble those of the Fifty Shades ... books, only with a lightbulb full of green dollar bills on it as well. To keep it short, it looks like someone is grumpy about these books making money. The description in combination with the part of the foreword that is available in the preview makes it clear that the author is also grumpy about this rising from a fanfiction story. I think I'll need another post to say how I feel about that particular issue.

Of course the author is fully entitled to his opinion on the matter.


Only don't talk about people making money with other people's work as a basis (i.e. write fanfic, change the names and sell) if you're selling your essay on someone else's work (with the title and the cover clearly leaning on the source's) at £1.53 - for 29 pages. Just as a comparison, Fifty Shades of Grey is £2.69 at 530 pages (those are all Kindle ebook prices btw). It just makes the whole argument a moot point. Maybe it's wrong to take money for original fiction that used to be fanfiction. I'm not saying that it's badly written or spiteful or that the author doesn't have a point. It's definitely something that needs to be discussed. But not at that money-per-page ratio - especially not if you can find all that info on it being a Twilight fanfic originally and the debate about that on the internet for free.


It just seems unethical. But that's just my opinion.