Larry Brooks

Story Engineering starts with the criteria and the architecture of storytelling-the engineering and design of a story-and uses it as the basis for narrative. The greatest potential of any story is found in the way six specific aspects of storytelling combine and empower each other on the page. When rendered artfully, they become a sum in excess of their parts. You'll learn to wrap your head around the big picture of storytelling at a professional level through a new approach that shows how to combine these six core competencies which include: four elemental competencies of concept, character, theme, and story structure (plot) two executional competencies of scene construction and writing voice

Story Engineering

One of the most common questions new writers ask professionals is how they wrote their book—what was their process for storytelling? Did they use an outline to plan the book, or write it from the seat of their pants? But really the question should be about the general principles and nature of storycraft—does every part of a story have what it needs to keep readers turning the pages? Bestselling author and creator of StoryFix.com Larry Brooks changes the sound of the writing conversation by introducing a series of detailed criteria for novelists of every level and genre to refer to while writing, regardless of their preferred writing method. Beginning with the broadest part of the story, the early checklists help writers to ensure that their novel is based on a premise rather than an idea, and gradually hones in on other elements to keep the story moving forward including: · dramatic tension · narrative strategy · scene construction Readers won't know or care about the process. But what Brooks offers here is a chance for readers to make the most of whichever process they choose, and in doing so cut years off their learning curve.

Great Stories Don't Write Themselves

Reinvigorate Your Fiction! You've written the first draft of your novel or screenplay, and you've released it into the world: to your critique group, to your most trusted beta readers, or even to an agent or an editor. But something's wrong. You're not getting the glowing response you had expected, or you might have even received a rejection. Your story is getting a "Meh..." when you had hoped for an "Amazing!" But have no fear--the piece you've sweated and bled over isn't dead on arrival. It just needs fixing. Story Fix is the answer to your revision needs. With practical techniques from critically acclaimed author and story coach Larry Brooks, you will learn how to: • Develop a story-fixing mind-set • Navigate the two essential realms of revision: story and execution • Evaluate your novel or screenplay against twelve crucial storytelling elements and essences. • Strengthen your concept and premise. • Punch up the dramatic tension, pacing, thematic weight, characterization, and more. • Align your story with proven structural principles. Filled with candid advice on the realities of the publishing world and helpful case studies of real authors who fixed their own stories, Story Fix isn't just about revision--it's about resurrection. Infuse your fiction with a much-needed jolt of electricity, and bring it back to life. "Larry Brooks is a superb storyteller and teacher. If anyone can fix your novel, it's him. Put this one on your desk and read it often." --Robert Dugoni, #1 Amazon and New York Times best-selling author of My Sister's Grave "Story Fix is the ultimate writer's companion for taking any manuscript to the next level. A staple for the beginner, a refresher for the pro." --Joe Moore, #1 Amazon and international best-selling co-author of The Blade and The Shield

Transform Your Novel from Broken to Brilliant

Story Fix

Introduces six important literary techniques that can be used to craft a successful story.

harnessing the underlying forces of storytelling

Story physics

When Every Month is NaNoWriMo

Two strangers with a taste for unusual sexual pastimes embark on a private game of sexual fantasy and perversion, a game that soon turns deadly, in a chilling tale of erotic obsession, betrayal, madness, and murder. Original.

Darkness Bound

Three ambitious executives--one woman and two men--embark on a retreat in the wilds of California as part of a seminar to build teamwork, trust, and awareness that turns into a battle for survival and the ultimate test of their moral, mental, and physical

Pressure Points

"Find him. Seduce him. Make him pay. When Bernadette Kane investigates her sister's suspicious death, she falls into an erotically charged relationship-with her sister's mysterious lover. He's rich, powerful, and possibly guilty of murder. But has Bernadette stumbled upon the perfect plan to avenge her sister's death-or has she stepped into the same nightmarish trap?"--Amazon.com.

Serpent's Dance

Marriage is hard. Living together in a committed, non-traditional relationship is just as hard, maybe more so. A less than completely satisfying level of happiness and fulfillment within a primary relationship is perhaps the most common human dysfunction in the modern world. So much so that we have come to accept something less than complete bliss in our marriages, partnerships and domestic arrangements as the normal state of things, an expectation born of human imperfection and the pressing need for constant compromise. We have redefined it as something less than the word bliss actually implies. Coming even mildly close to bliss is considered a rousing success, but even then, whatever sliver of unrest, anxiety and inconsistency remain can flare into a torrent of restlessness that could one day again render you single . In CHASING BLISS, Larry Brooks shows us a path toward bucking that trend through the channeling of our imperfection toward a perfectly functional awareness of how we might be contributing to the problem, while becoming coach and therapist when we're not. While repeatedly reminding the reader that some problems remain the province of professional counselors, CHASING BLISS holds up a mirror to the many ways time and apathy become toxic factors in reducing loving relationships to something less than how they began, with kindness, togetherness, sexual satisfaction and hope the price of growing apart while growing weary of each other. The book is divided into three sections: ten reasons why men might cheat... ten reasons why women might leave the nest for a better life... and an exploration of eight primary realms of relationship, the mastery of which becomes a tool chest of strategies and solutions that not only mitigate decline, but serve to refuel the chemistry and hope that once brought you together. This goes beyond the theoretical with specific actionable responses and alternatives to some of the most common challenges couples face, while clarifying tough, indisputable truths about the roles we play in our own domestic tragedies. Even if we feel - all the way to divorce court - that it was the other person's fault. This, promises the author, is the stuff your shrink will goad you into realizing for yourself, but without the weeks and months of therapy it could take to reach that point with clarity and purpose. It's all right here, in your face, unassailable and immediately useful in real life. In her Foreword to the book, Dr. Carrie Rubin says this: the beauty of this book is its power to be a tool for both relationship recovery and healthy relationship maintenance. For those in good shape, its advice will serve as a protective life vest, one that will keep you from sinking into troubled waters." Brooks knows from where he speaks, having been down the road to failure not once, but twice, and is now twenty years happily married to a woman that challenges him to be the best version of himself, with immovable consequences if he is not. "On paper we shouldn't work," he writes, "but we are living in a state I can only describe as bliss, if bliss is defined as inclusive of the trials and challenges that are inevitable and ready to rip you apart. Now we are stronger than the problems life throws our way, not because we are better or smarter than couples who don't make it, but because we are vulnerable to these truths and committed to the principles of interaction and loving partnership that are necessary to make it to the other side." These truths are the heart and soul of CHASING BLISS, a book for people who want to make love work, but fear they aren't up to it. With these principles, you just might become the couple that gets there through an understanding that bliss is not a destination or a finish line, but the road itself. Which, armed with empowered awareness and sensitivity, you can now actually pave with the good intentions that others blame.

Larry Brooks

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