Over the years I’ve read multiple books about writing, because hey! I’m a writer. Some of the books have been extremely helpful, and others have been tossed out because of content I wasn’t okay with. Some of the books I’ve read over and over again, and will probably continue to do so for years, and other books I’ve just skimmed through. Obviously not all books are created equal.

So, today I wanted to share with you two of the best books I’ve found that deal with the writing craft. They are both extremely easy to read, understand, and glean from. They are relatable, easily applicable, and practical.

Go Teen Writers (surprise, surprise), is probably my favorite writing book of all time. Yes, it is geared toward teens, but it’s chocked full of information that is helpful to writers of any age. It’s also extremely pleasing aesthetically. I have both the kindle and the paperback version (hey, it’s a great book!), and sometimes I like flipping through the paperback just to enjoy all the little boxes and notebook pages and fonts that are used.

The book includes a wide range of topics, starting with how to  make sure your plot works and ending with building a career. Plus, there’s a whole huge section in the back (like 50 pages) full of lists and extras and all sorts of tips that are extremely helpful for writers.

Go Teen Writers was written by the founders of the blog by the same name, Stephanie Morrill and Jill Williamson. There are multiple sections throughout the book where they relate back to their own stories and talk about their own journeys to publication, so that’s pretty cool.

The book is clean, fun, interesting, and so thoroughly helpful. I highly recommend it.

Finding the Core of your Story is the other book on my list for today. According to Amazon I bought this book in November of 2013, and I would guess I’ve read it at least five times. The book is short, only 108 pages, which makes reading it a breeze. I have the kindle version which means I can just read a few pages any time I want and glean some of the wisdom.

Finding the Core of your Story is all about figuring out how to narrow an entire book down into one sentence. Ahem. For real. 80,000 words down to 40-ish words. Crazy, right? Any of my beta readers can testify to the fact that I have a habit of being wordy, so figuring out how to narrow things down can be a challenge for me (to put it mildly).

The point of narrowing a book down to one sentence is so you can have a tag line, which is something that is useful in marketing. It’s also a great way for an author to get a clear view of what their story is really about. Because, even writers can be confused by their own books. (Not a very good place to be, in case you wondered.)

Finding the Core of your Story is a very easy read. Not only is it short, but it’s interesting, makes a lot of sense, draws the reader in, and is helpful and has instructions that are easy to follow. Plus, once again, it’s clean. And once again, I highly recommend it. (Of course, or it wouldn’t be on this post.)

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What are some of your favorite writing books?