The Irresistible Novel: How to Craft an Extraordinary Story That Engages Readers from Start to Finish by Jeff Gerke (PDF)

Description

Discover Your Voice and Enthrall Readers!The craft of writing is filled with various debates: Should I include a prologue? Should I delete all adverbs from my manuscript? Just how much backstory–if any–can I include in my story? These questions–and their often-contradictory answers–can cause confusion, frustration, and even paralysis in the writer.The Irresistible Novel frees you from the limits of so-called “rules” and instead provides you with a singular goal: You must engage your readers from beginning to end. Filled with down-to-earth discussions on the various debates of writing, as well as innovative research on neuroscience and reader response, this book shows you how to: • Navigate the various debates on writing fiction–showing versus telling, purple prose, outlining, writing description, and more–to decide what kind of novelist you want to be. • Hack your reader’s brain to hook her interest and trigger emotional engagement from the very first page. • Incorporate enduring elements of storytelling from masters like Joseph Campbell, Aristotle, and Carl Jung. Readers want to be swept away by your stories. When you eschew the rules and focus on your readers’ desires, you’re free to write truly irresistible fiction.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I’ve read and enjoyed several of Jeff Gerke’s books. This is not one of them. I’m not sure who his intended audience is, but this does not seem to suit either beginning writers or more advance writers.In Part One (pages 1-145), Gerke presents some frequently given writing advice. Topics range from prologues to amount of detail to particular grammatical features, such as gerunds and passives. For each, he presents the stand of those for the device and the position of those against, and then his own opinion on the topic, and he gives reasons why each takes the position they do. For each topic, these opinions are followed by a section Gerke calls “Getting Past the Gatekeepers,” in which he tells novelists how to avoid getting their novel instantly rejected by agents and publishers who may be against the device in focus. For example, when discussing whether or not prologues are acceptable, he gives the viewpoint of the opposing sides (never versus Sure, why not?), plus his own opinion, which seems to go along with the ‘Sure, why not’ group. To get past the gatekeepers he says to avoid titling a section “Prologue,” and to call it “Chapter One” instead.Following Gerke’s own formula, here is My Opinion on this section: Beginning writers will not find enough solid information in this section to make it useful. He may say what the various opinions are, but if a beginning author doesn’t yet understand showing versus telling or point of view, Part One will neither help him or her handle the device well nor make an informed decision about which opinion given is most valid. On the other hand, experienced writers have probably already figured out what Gerke mainly ends up saying: it depends. Sometimes third person works, sometimes it doesn’t. Usually showing is better, but sometimes we slip a little telling in there to accomplish a particular purpose. A writer should learn what these devices are, practice using them, and come understand how, when, and where they are most effective.Part Two of this book (pages 147-179) is where Gerke makes his main point: “You must engage your reader from beginning to end.” This is not revolutionary. In fact, much of what is stated in this section is not new; Gerke says so himself: “There’s really nothing new or surprising in what we’re learning…” (169). I believe Gerke feels his approach is different because he tries to use brain chemistry to give us new understanding on the matter. I found two problems with this. First of all, as I mentioned, the main points were nothing new: engage the readers, create a main character readers can relate to, make your readers feel as though they are experiencing the events alongside the characters (transport your readers), add conflict… Secondly, the “science” he uses in this section is weak. In a sense, he seems to think so too. Here are some of his own statements about this material: “The findings about oxytocin and narrative are validated by Dr. Zak’s laboratory work, but much of the rest of it is extrapolation and his educated guesses” (151). “Dr. Zak was pretty much horrified when I told him I wanted something like a brain chemistry story map. That’s because we can observe and theorize about what’s going on in a reader’s mind…But that doesn’t mean we’d understand it or be able to do it intentionally” (162). And he quotes Dr. Zak as saying on this matter, “I think this is where the art beats the science…Writers have deep intuitions on how to engage readers and how to do this across genres, but the science of what is happening step by step, which would allow one to reverse engineer the process, simply isn’t there” (162).My Opinion: Gerke believes he is revolutionizing how we write, saying that what we need to do is use the science of the brain. However, the scientist says this isn’t possible to do yet. That doesn’t stop Gerke, though; he goes right on to build his story map, even while adding qualifiers: it’s what may go on in a reader’s brain and the details about the hormones involved are simply a guess.Part Three of the book summarizes the ideas of a number of others and covers the monomyth—the hero’s journey, character archtypes, and how to engage your readers’ emotions.My Opinion on the book as a whole: I admit that my opinion is partially formed by this book’s errors (for example, implying that Chicago Manual of Style’s guidelines are rules that should not be broken—CMS considers them guidelines), contradictions (spending Part One debunking the rules and then stating “Theoretically, some of these rules can be used to strengthen a section (or an entire manuscript) that isn’t working,” (p. 147) followed by a number of examples of how these rules can help), and guesses about the science (as mentioned above). Gerke justifies the need for this book of his by stating readers don’t really care about craft, so we need to get away from craft. Yet the same could be said about what Gerke teaches; when reading a story, readers don’t really care about what’s going on in their brain or about whether the story conforms to the monomyth. The rules of craft and Gerke’s suggestions presented here are all possible tools writers can use to engage readers. I just feel that the material is presented in more depth elsewhere and in a way that will do a better job of helping novelists improve their skills. Unless you are intrigued by how the brain chemistry may figure in to the way readers react to a story, save your money. If you are wanting a book that gives more usable instruction, choose a different one, perhaps James Scott Bell’s Plot and Structure for a start.

⭐I don’t often throw around the phrase “must read,” but all writers — and editors — must read this book.The Irresistible Novel explains one of the great conundrums of publishing: why writers like Dan Brown, Stephenie Meyer, and E.L. James have best-selling books despite producing mediocre prose.In Part One Gerke debunks a vast number of so-called “rules” that have been foisted on writers down the ages by critique partners and, let’s be honest, editors who didn’t know the difference between a style choice and a rule. It’s a fantastic analysis, and Gerke does a great job of laying out the pros and cons of each item so you can — radical thought here — make up your own mind. This section will liberate writers who’ve been hamstrung by misguided advice.Part Two gets to the bad-prose conundrum. Gerke shows that what sells books is not exquisitely crafted sentences or perfect grammar, but specific hooks and emotional triggers that stimulate chemical reactions in readers’ brains. Dan Brown is a best-seller because of adrenaline, and Meyer and James crush it by stimulating dopamine.Part Three examines monomyth, archetypes, and rhetoric to show how master storytellers and orators have used these techniques to hook listeners and readers since ancient days.I said “all writers” and I meant it. Although Gerke’s focus is on novel writing, these techniques are equally applicable to narrative nonfiction and other forms of storytelling. Besides, every writer needs to know that it’s all right to use adverbs as long as you do so appropriately.

⭐5 stars for the first 2/3 of the book, in which the author dissects most of the rules, good, bad, and indifferent, of fiction writing.But after a bit of reflection, am still not sure what to make of the last 1/3 of the book, which veers into neuroscience and how writers can supposedly crank up chemicals in the readers’ brains to get a desired result (fame, fortune, and dedicated followers, some of whom become addicted to the author’s works and tell others to buy or borrow or steal those books). If that were not complicated enough, heavyweights Joseph Campbell, Carl Gustav Jung, and Aristotle and their takes (respectively) on the Monomyth, archetypes, and rhetoric are examined. The author translates Campbell’s, Jung’s, and Aristotle’s principles into tools a writer can use. Once again, invoking a response from the reader is tantamount.As the author puts it: “When what’s happening to the character has a physical effect on the reader, transportation has happened. That’s what we mean when we say we’ve been swept away by a story. It’s what we are unconsciously (or consciously) looking for whenever we sit down to read a work of fiction: We want to be whisked away to another world.”Overall, it seemed that the first part of the book was a sort of general blueprint and the remainder became very complicated, detailed blueprints for the writer of fiction to use.

⭐I love the way this book is structured. Jeff covers writing rules you hear all the time then shares when you can and can’t break the rules and what he does in his own writing. It helped me see that I don’t have to take all the advice I get from other writers. Sometimes the rules work and sometimes they don’t and Jeff’s examples are excellent. I highly recommend this to any aspiring author. Jeff’s style makes for an entertaining read too.

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