Indie Life – 10 Must have Books on Writing and Publishing

Welcome to another Indie Life post! Today I’m going to share a resource list of books for the Indie Author. Each of these books I have read cover to cover and love for one reason or another. Allow me to share.

2,000 to 10,000 by Rachel Aaron. I recently completed a 10 month trauma of writer’s block which was recently halted by this book by Rachel Aaron: If writing fast fascinates you, as it does me, you’ll love this quick, cheap, but valuable read on how to increase your productivity.

Next is my all time favorite book on plotting, and story telling, a book that I reread EVERY time I start a new book, Chris Vogler’s A Writer’s Journey. Based on Joseph Campbell’s research on myth it’s useful to any writer.

Next is another book along the same lines. Save the Cat by Blake Snyder is another screenwriter’s take on how to tell a story. This takes it from a different angle than Vogler’s.

21 Master Plots by Ronald Tobias is a book I picked up early on in my writing career and whenever I’m considering an entirely different style I read through this book. Each chapter lays out the basics of a different plot line. It’s really great to make sure you’re hitting all the important events that readers expect from different stories, like the difference between a quest and an adventure story.

Goal, Motivation & Conflict by Debra Dixon. You won’t be able to find this one, except maybe in a library. I wish they would print this one again. I borrowed it while it was still in print and sorely wish I had purchased it for my craft bookself. Alas, it has some of the best information on breaking down goal, motivation, and conflict. Other books discuss this, but for me this book is by far the easiest to follow.

Donald Maass is a genius. There, I said it. It’s true. You should read all his books on writing, they are worth your time. The Fire in Fiction taught me a great deal about conflict and tension in my writing. If you can commit what is here to memory your writing will be awesome. (I was going to toss in a flame reference… but I don’t want to be cheesy. )

I found Alan Watt’s book The 90-day novel while writing my third novel. They say every book you write is different. Alan’s take on novel writing is different than what I’ve focused on in the past which was mostly plot. This book starts, stays and finishes with character motivation. A great book.

You can’t be Indie and not know who David Gaughran is. Check out his blog, always great information. His lateast book Let’s get Visible is about launching your book and keeping it up there in the rankings. Most of this information I have gleaned from the bajillion websites I read on self-pub, but he also covers Amazon’s algorithms as of the April 2013. And it’s very important to be up to date on what is going on in the world of our distributors.

If you’re self-pubbing or not, Duolit is a duo you should check out. Shannon and Toni have a great system of passing information on to us writers with regards to marketing our work. They have free pdf’s, inexpensive guides and great online courses. The give you the basics AND the nitty gritty, stuff you can put to use asap, and you should! Building your Fanbase gives you examples and tells you what you need to do, step by step. I could just hug them both. Book Marketing Basics helps you with um, everything.

One last book that I think every writer should have is this: A mentor novel. A book you LOVE, that you wish to emulate, and that falls under your style and genre. Breaking down my own mentor books has been very educational to me as a writer. I think I might just use that for a whole other blog post. 🙂

So tell me what is on your list of MUST HAVE books?

Happy Reading and Writing!

Check out other Indie Life posts on the list below.