Recommended books on writing

The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron
The Art of Writing and the Gifts of Writers, C. S. Lewis
Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott
Damn Fine Story, Chuck Wendig
Elements of Writing Fiction: Beginnings, Middles & Ends, Nancy Kress
Elements of Writing Fiction: Characters & Viewpoint, Orson Scott Card
Elements of Writing Fiction: Conflict, Action & Suspense, William Noble
Elements of Writing Fiction: Scene & Structure, Jack M. Bickham
The Emotion Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Expression, Angela Ackerman & Becca Puglisi
The Emotional Craft of Fiction, Donald Maass
The Hero With a Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell
Hooked: Write Fiction That Grabs Readers at Page One and Never Lets Them Go, Les Edgerton
If You Want to Write, Brenda Ueland
Novelist’s Essential Guide to Creating Plot, J. Madison Davis

On Moral Fiction, John Gardner
On Writing by Stephen King
On Writing Well, William Zinsser
Revising Fiction: Making Sense of the Madness, Kirt Hickman
Revision & Self-Editing: Techniques for Transforming Your First Draft Into a Finished Novel, James Scott Bell
Screenwriting Tricks For Authors, Alexandra Sokoloff
Secrets of Character, Matt Bird
Secrets of Story, Matt Bird
Self-Editing for Fiction Writers, Browne & King
Stein on Writing, Sol Stein
The Story Grid, Shawn Coyne
The War of Art, Steven Pressfield
The Writing Life, Annie Dillard
Write Great Fiction: Plot & Structure, James Scott Bell
Zen in the Art of Writing, Ray Bradbury

Tools & Organizations

Scrivener (word processing with lots of functionality for writers)
Autocrit (an online editing tool–I use the pro version, and it’s worth every penny)
Mynoise.net and asoftmurmur.com (soundscape generators)
Evernote (note taker and organizer)
Social Security Administration name list (find era-appropriate character names)
Freedom (web blocker)
Dragon dictation
Google ngram viewer (find the right word for the era you’re writing in)

Download PDFs of the Workshops Below