Full title: Plan Your Novel Like A Pro: And Have Fun Doing It! by Beth Barany and Ezra Barany
While there is some excellent advice in this book, with several different methods of novel planning detailed and a reassurance that it’s not a one-size-fits-all solution because everyone’s writer brain works differently, I do think it fails in one fundamental way; it doesn’t include all the information. And worse yet, the book has links to send the reader off elsewhere to find the information, which means you are constantly clicking off somewhere else or if you have the paperback version, putting the book down to go to a computer and find stuff out.
It’s very laudable of the authors to credit other professionals for the tools they have created and link to them, but it means that this book in and of itself isn’t a complete resource. The authors even tell you that early on when they encourage you to sign up to their mailing list to get a bonus workbook (and other free resources). Now, you might be the kind of person who likes all that sort of stuff; great, good for you. I’m really not. And I didn’t appreciate, once I’d requested the free workbook, getting 6 emails in the first week and another 2 every week since. That was JUST signing up for the workbook. I don’t even want to think about how many I’d be getting if I’d followed all those links and joined all the other mailing lists to get free resources from all those other pros.
There’s some good stuff in here, but it’s actually mostly not ‘in here’, but elsewhere, and in places where the ‘price’ of getting it is being signed up to mailing lists all over the place. Unless you really LIKE being snowed under with email every morning, don’t do it. Go read Rock Your Plot by Cathy Yardley or maybe Take Off Your Pants by Libbie Hawker instead.
Disclaimer: I received a review copy of this title via NetGalley.
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