Review: Well-organized, useful information - with one caveat
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 01 26, 2014
This book is well-organized and gives a lot of resources and information about writing a short non-fiction kindle book. I haven't read other books on this subject, so I can't comment as to if the material is similar to the content of others on this topic.Nancy covers several topics: outlining, researching, common grammatical errors, the writing process, formatting for kindle (you don't have to do it yourself!), and more.A lot of books will tell you you can write a book in a short time span, and Nancy's book advocates the 72 hour strategy. The advantage of this method is that if you want, if you are well-versed on your subject, you can produce a lot of content in a focused, short amount of time. She advises to not edit yourself along the way; I agree that this is effective to just write without censoring or critiquing until finished. This is especially effective advice for perfectionists.Here comes the caveat and why I took away a star.I expected the author to mention towards the end that you should let the manuscript sit for at least a few days to proofread again. After 72 hours of writing, you are too close to your work to be able to spot errors and potential weak spots. But she didn't. I think if Nancy had done so with this book, she would have caught the few errors she made and the book would be stronger.If you proofread once or twice and immediately publish to fit your 72 hour time frame, you do a disservice to your manuscript, your hard work and your readers. Get at least one other person to read your work, preferably several. Let your work sit a while, a week at least! You aren't on a deadline like you would be if writing an article for a newspaper, magazine, etc.I received a free copy of this book from Story Cartel in exchange for an honest review.