How to Write Like a Writer: A Sharp and Subversive Guide to Ignoring Inhibitions, Inviting Inspiration, and Finding Your True Voice

Foster (How to Read Literature Like a Professor), an English professor at the University of Michigan, Flint, offers in this friendly guide practical advice on developing a voice and writing “like you mean it.” The bulk of his instructions come on the topic of building confidence, for which he provides numberous exercises—one can get in touch with their “intellectual/emotional response system” by writing a fake review, and writing about “a complex painting in massive detail” can sharpen one’s description chops. Foster insists that the key to writing is “having something to say” and “knowing what that something is,” and gives a rousing “pep talk” about how to get started writing, which, he claims, is the hardest part. He urges writers to “burn your thesaurus” and frequently references the works of Ernest Hemingway, John McPhee, and Joan Didion as examples of sentence structure and voice. Though his personal examples feel a little self-indulgent and unnecessary (ironic, given that he warns against the dangers of using the first person), he’s solid on classroom tips and tricks, as in his point-by-point list of what makes a good thesis. Students will appreciate these handy notes. (Sept.)