The List

After a party one night my friend Lance asked me how many writing books I had read in my life. With one thing and another, and no little ammount of whisky, we started what I came to call the The List. It eventually stretched reached seven or eight pages in length across multiple notebooks as I kept remembering or reading more. So, as something of a memorial and something of a checklist, but mostly for my general amusement, here are the first few pages of the list. Please note these are in no particular order or ranking except what my mind recalled at the time. I'll add the rest of it as I dig them out of my notebooks.

Page 1

• George Orwell, "Why I write"
• Le Guin, Ursula. Steering the Craft
• Bradbury, Ray. Zen in the Art of Writing.
• Clarke, Roy Peter. How To Write Short
  • ". The Glamour of Grammar
  • ". The Art of X-Ray Reading
  • ". Murder Your Darlings 
• Pinker, Steven. The Sense of Style
• Bright, Suzie. How to Write a Dirty Story
• King, Stephen. On writing
• Steinbek, John. Jornal of Novel
• Swain, Wright V. Techniques of the Selling Writer
• Vandermeer, Jeff, Wonderbook
• SF Writers Grotto. 642 Things to write about
• AG Sertillanges, O.P., The Intellectual Life
• Burkeman, Oliver. Four Thousand Weeks
• Aaron, Rachel. 2,000 to 10,000
• Lisle, Holly. Create a Character Clinic (and others in that series)
• Roven Haver, Madelyne. The Nasty Little writing Book
• Beattie, Bryce. Pulp Era Writing Tips
• Brody, Jessica. Save the Cat Writes a Novel.
• Cameron, Julia, The Artists Way 
  • “. The Sound of Paper
  • “. Walking in the World
• Lee, Sharon and Steve Miller. The Wrong Lance
• Forsyth, Mark. The Elements of Eloquence
• Currey, Mason. Daily Rituals: How Artist Write
• Duhigg, Charles. The Power of Habit.
• Larry, Brooks, Story Engineering
• Browne, Renni and Dave King. Self Editing for Fiction Writers
• Hiyakawa, S.I. Language in Action
• Harold, M. Page. Storyteller Tools
• Scalzi, John, The Mallet of Loving Correction
• Silverberg, Robert. Science Fiction 101
• Lubbock, Percy. The Craft of Fiction

Page 2

• Nicholson, Scott, et.al. Write Good or Die
• Lisel, Holly. Create A World Clinic
  • ". Mugging the Muse
  • ". Page Turning Scenes
• Nelson, Jill. Rivet your Readers with Deep POV
• Lerner, Betsy. The Forest for the Trees
• McKee, Robert. Story
• Lamett. Bird by Bird
• Goldberg. Writing Down the Bones
• Turco, Lewis. The Book of Forms
• Curtis, Richard. How to Be Your own Literary Agent
• Belsky, Scott. Making Ideas Happen
• Bettelheim. The Uses of Enchantment
• Boechner, Frederick. Telling the Truth
• O'Connor, Flannery. A Prayer Jornal
• Lewis, C.S., Selected Literary Essays
• Tolkein, J.R.R. "Tree and Leaf", "Mythopeia", & "On Fairy Stories"
• Bakhtin, "The Dialogic Imagination"
• Paxton. "The Poeties of Personification"
• St. Bonaventure, "On the Reduction of Arts to Theology"
• Campbell, Joseph. Hero with a Thousand Faces
• Emerson "The Poet"
• King Stephen, Danse Macabre
• Lewis, C.S. The Discarded Image
• Vogler, Christopher, The Writer's Journey
• Zinsser, William, On Writing Well
• Jayers, Dorothy, The Mind of the Maker
• Schotts Book of Miscellany
• Sir Phillip Sidney. The Defense of Poesy
• Twain, Mark. "The Awful German Languge"
• Maass, Donald. Writing the Break-out Novel
• Tharp,Twyla. The Creative Life
• Strunk & White. Elements of Style

From Murder Your Darlings by Roy Peter Clark

This list is only books summariezed or commented on by Clark in the text. For the complete bibilography see the back of the book. [added 3/9/2025]

• Aristotle. Poetics
• Barthes, Roland. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography
  • ". Writing Degree Zero
• ed. Edward Bliss Jr. In Search of Light: The Broadcasts of Edward R. Murrow
• Brande, Dorthea. Becoming a Writer
• Boyd, Brian. On the Orgins of Stories: Evoultion, Cognition, and Fiction
• Campbell D.D., George. The Philosophy of Rhetoric
• Egri, Lajos. The Art of Dramatic Writing: Its Basis in the Creative Interpretation of Human Motives
• Elbow, Peter. Writing without Teachers: Techniques for Mastering the Writing Process
  • ". Writing with Power
• trans. David Ferry. The Epistles of Horace
  • ". "Ars Poetica" (or "Art of Poetry")
• Flesch, Rudolf. The Art of Readable Writing
• Forester, E. M. Aspects of the Novel
• Fry, Northrop. Fables of Identity: Studies in Poetic Mythology
• Goldberg, Natalie. Wild Mind: Living the Writer's Life
• Gornick, Vivian. The Situation and the Story: The Art of Personal Narrative
• Gunning, Robert. How to Take the Fog out of Writing
• Hale, Constance and Jessie Scanlan. Wired Style: Principals of English Use in the Digital Age
• Hall, Donald. Writing Well
• Hayakawa, S. I. Language in Thought and Action
• Huley, Adolf. Brave New World Revisited
• John-Steiner, Vera. Notebooks of the Mind: Explorations of Thinking
• Johnson, Charles. The Way of the Writer: Reflections on the Art and the Craft of Storytelling
• Karr, Mary. The Art of Memior
• King, Stephen. On Writing: A Memior of Craft
• Lamott, Anne. Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
• LeGuin, Ursula K. Steering the Craft: A 21st Century Guide to Sailing the Sea of Story
• McPhee, John. Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process
  • ed. William Howarth. The John McPhee Reader
• Murphy, James. Quintilian: On the Teaching of Speaking and Writing
• ed. Thomas Newkirk and Lisa Miller. The Essential Don Murray: Lessons from America's Greatest Writing Teacher
• Orwell, George. 1984
• Postan, Neil. Amusing Ourselves to Death
• Provost, Gary. 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing: Proven Professional Techniques for Writing with Style and Power
• Quiller-Couch, Sir Arthur. On the Art of Writing
• Rosenblatt, Louise. Literature as Exploration
  • ". The Reader, the Text, the Poem: The Transactional Theory of the Literary Work
• Strunk & White. Elements of Style
• Talese, Gay. Frank Sinatra Has a Cold: And Other Essays
• ed. Robert H. Taylor and Herman W. Liebert. Authors at Work
• Tierno, Michael. Aristotle's Poetics for Screenwriters: Storytelling Secrets from the Greatest Mind in Western Civilzation
• Ueland, Brenda. If You Want to Write: A Book About Art, Independence, and Spirit
• Vonnegut, Kurt and Lee Stringer. Like Shaking Hands with God: A Conversation about Writing
• ed. Tom Wolfe and E. W. Johnson. The New Journalism
• Wood, James. How Fiction Works
• Yagoda, Ben. The Sound on the Page: Great Writers Talk about Style and Voice in Writing
• Zinsser, William. On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction

Post updated 3/9/25 to add Murder Your Darlings.