Most of my non-technical reading orbits the same question: how do stories work, and how do you get better at making and remembering them. This set is squarely that: craft, memory, and the practical business of putting fiction in front of people.
Writing for Emotional Impact: Derek Sivers’ book notes Sivers distills Karl Iglesias’s screenplay-craft book into notes dense with usable ideas. Several map directly onto my novella work: the reader’s emotion matters more than the character’s, plot is “the ordering of emotions,” scenes should advance the story and deepen character while landing a visceral response, and writers should enter late and leave early. Sivers rates the repetitive book only 6/10, but its craft lessons apply beyond film.
Active recall
Herman argues that he remembers things because he writes about them, not because he has an unusual gift. He cites the Karpicke and Blunt (2011) retrieval-practice study, where free recall beat rereading and concept mapping on a delayed test, even when the test itself used concept mapping. His decade of journaling and a notes.txt full of scribbles amount to free-recall practice. He rarely rereads them; the act of writing does the work.
The Man Who Reads Books for a Living (One Every Two Days) A profile of Clarke Speicher, a freelance “reader” who evaluates roughly one book every two days for screen-adaptation potential and writes coverage that influences Hollywood options. The invisible craft job has no salary or security, now happens entirely by email, and carries the uncomfortable possibility that an author may learn their book was reduced to a report in three hours. It is an unusual view from the other side of a writer’s submission.
Where do you publish or share your novel stories? (r/WritingWithAI) A community thread of writers comparing where they actually put longer fiction (personal sites, Wattpad, Royal Road, newsletters, and so on) and what each venue is good and bad for. Practical if you’re weighing how to share a novella beyond your own blog.
Write for one person Julia Evans’s comic argues for writing to one specific person. The result becomes sharper, warmer, and easier to produce than a piece aimed at “everyone.” It is short enough to remember.
Science Fiction and Fantasy Book Awards A browsable database of award-winning and finalist SFF novels from the Hugo, Nebula, Locus, World Fantasy, Arthur C. Clarke, and other awards. Filters include award, year, subgenre, winner status, and Goodreads rating. I can use it to build a reading list and see what the field currently rewards while writing in the genre myself.