At this time of year, it is always useful to turn the focus on yourself, to reflect back on the past twelve months, to look at your year in review, to see what you have achieved and how far you have come…so that you might learn from your experiences and set new goals for the forthcoming year.
After you have completed the first draft of your novel, it is time to begin revising and rewriting. Sounds easy, doesn’t it? But what does this actually mean, what steps do you need to take?
Have you ever found yourself wanting to purchase the most useful book on a particular topic? Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Goodreads all include a book review function on their sites where satisfied readers can rate and review the books they’ve read. But how to you write a short review? This week I focus on reviewing non-fiction books.
As part of my writerly research, I went to the library to review the first page of several novels – my purpose was not to write a whole book review. I was particularly interested in what hooks a reader into a story, what keeps them keep reading, and how are first pages written and constructed to do just this.
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I read Mary Ellen Jordan’s 2005 memoir Balander: My Year in Arnhem Land and was interested by the act of remembering – how and what we remember and how we convey this to others.
Here is my critique of her book.
