Books for Writing Groups to Read Together
These writing books all mix short chapters with writing exercises that make it easy to break the book up to read with a group.
One of the more productive things to do with a writing group is to work through a craft book together. It has several advantages over everyone bringing in a random piece to discuss. It forces everyone to write something new, which means everyone is working on pieces at the same stage. It also gives all the pieces a common thread which means everyone has a point of entry to talk about the pieces. And for groups with different experience levels, writing from the same exercises gives an entry point for discussions that are productive for everyone.
List Criteria: These writing books all mix short chapters with writing exercises that make it easy to break the book up to read with a group.
Steering the Craft - Ursula K. Le Guin
Le Guin’s excellent, craft focused book is designed to be used with groups. In fact it's orignal subtitle was "Exercises and Discussions on Story Writing for the Lone Navigator or the Mutinous Crew." The many exercises lend themselves to groups working on building their writing skills. My only caveat is that the last chapter on how to run a critique group is uses the outdated Milford method and should not be followed. See my comments on that topic at the end of my review here.
Wild Mind - Natalie Goldberg
For groups looking to explore memoir or who are focused on writing together, the exercises in this book would make excellent warm-ups or discussion pieces. The reading sections are also particularly short, short enough that you could read them aloud together if you have a group that needs to do the reading together too.
The Artists Way - Julia Cameron
Set up as a twelve week program, the structure of Artist’s way is perfect for groups looking to act as accountability partners. With chapters aimed at reconnecting with your artistic self, finding your creative rhythm, and developing productive habits, Artists Way, or its follow-ups Walking in this World and The Sound of Paper are a good place to start for groups working in diverse fields, or those looking to act more for accountability than critique.
The Emotional Craft of Fiction - Donald Maass
This book would be excellent for groups writing fiction and looking to improve the emotional impact of their work. The exercises are sure to spark interesting conversations. Be warned however that some of the exercises involve quite a bit of writing. This is one of the books my own group chose to read together last year and we all found it to be helpful at our diverse levels of experience.
Fake Query Letters by Dead Authors - Brown & Barker
This would be a fun book to work through for a group with several members ready to begin querying. Beginning with examples of what not to do with familiar books, the second half of the book is a walkthrough which produces each of the pieces of writing you need to query a novel. Querying is a long, disheartening process, and it can be a lot more fun to do it with a supportive group.
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