Worlds of Wonder: How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy [Paperback]

2) CON: Most of the examples used are from the authors own writings. A few times I wanted to shout, "Marketing ploy", but he was honest enough in his sharing that the irritation was short-lived.

3) PRO: This is the book to the art of Writing, that drafting a mission statement is to running a business. You get the insipriation, the vision, for where the writing needs to go in many areas without the speicific checklist on how the logistics need to flow. The logistics is what he encourages me as a writer to discover for myself...as I write. I left this book feeling "empowered" to write. I have my mission statement.

4)PRO: One of the most eye-opening chapters were, Memes and To Be Or Naught To Be. I walked away enlightened to the greater universe of possiblities that are at my fingertips as a writer.

"Oh," you say, "that guy."

Yeah. Him. But that's not all he's done. He's written for Twilight Zone, Babylon 5, Star Trek: Next Gen, and more, in addition to lots more, TV and novels: The Martian Child, Yesterday's Children, When Harlie Was One. . . . He's well equipped to write this guide (the full title being Worlds of Wonder: How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy).

The first time through, reading WW is a 5-star experience. Gerrold will not only give you continually good advice from page 1 all the way to page 238, he'll keep you laughing. Or nodding, if you're not easily tickled. The guy made me want to know more about him. He's not only a capable fiction writer, he's got non-fiction stories to tell, that much is obvious, and you'll be interested to read more by him. His experiences in the industry scream to be told, and in a perfect world, he would have been able to go off on long tangents.

But, no, he (pretty much) keeps us grounded on the subject matter. He takes you through the writing process, from structuring your story, to composing love scenes, to using metaphors and pronouns--from beginnings to middles to ends, he touches them all. He talks about the differences between science and fantasy. He talks about world-building, alien-building, plot-building. His chapters are bite-size treats, inviting, non-threatening, and as soon as the chapter is over you wish it had been longer. Chapter after chapter fly by until, suddenly, you've finished the book--craving more words from this intelligent author.

For me, that was part of the problem, though, and that's why the book only gets, in the end, 4 stars. Upon completion of the last page, my satisfaction went from a light, happy sigh, as I closed the book, to a heavy, brow-furrowing harrumph. After reading Worlds of Wonder, though the advice was indeed helpful, I didn't feel empowered to write a science fiction tale of my own. I did feel damn ready to drop everything and get to work on a "normal" story--the advice crisscrosses all fictional boundaries. But specifically sci-fi? Fantasy? Nuh-uh. As it turns out, Gerrold's book wasn't enough.

I examined my feelings on this matter until I realized what went wrong. My mistake had lain in assumption.

I assumed I would be reading a nitty gritty book for building science fiction; I assumed I was going to find equal and opposite help painting fantasy backdrops. I was EXPECTING this book to give me a lot of technical help, which I need, because scientific fact is my weakness. I was expecting, on the fantasy end of the genre, ideas for adding a fantastic flavor to my stories. These chapters were completely missing. (I'm beginning to suspect that they were never included in the first place, that there's been some sit-comical mistake, and I'm still waiting by my mailbox hoping Gerrold will realize his error and send the missing pages out to his fans, post haste. I'm growing weary of holding my breath, though.)

To those of you who are hoping Worlds of Wonder will solve your technical "sci-fan" writing questions, I say, "Keep shopping." It won't. Rather, it's an overview of the genre. A darn well written overview, though. It WILL entertain and educate you, despite it's lack of specifics. In and of itself, World's of Wonder is a good read.

As a how-to book, it only gets 3.5-ish stars. As you can see, when faced with extreme doubt, I sided with 4 stars. Some of you might have toppled leftward to 3. But you people are Negative Nellies. The book is too good to be called "okay."

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Highlights in no particular order:
* David Gerrold's writing teachers, the worst of them being the "best" of them.
* A few spontaneous exercises
* A difficult task: writing in E-Prime (or: eliminating "to be"). Good stuff.
* More good stuff: metric prose for high impact moments. I just wish Gerrold had expounded this technical style. The chapter ended too quickly, David!
* Language, distinction, mastery, and other memes.
* Love scenes versus sex scenes.
* Beginnings, middles, and "punch lines."
* Distinguishing science and fantasy
* "What is a story?"
* The power of the word "if."
* A yoooosssssful guide for deciding what should go in a paragraph. Plus: how to spread out description over several paragraphs.
* And pretty much anything else he has to say. Even though he is "some Star Trek" author (so called by "A Reader From USA").

If "A Reader From USA" had actually read this book, he'd have known that David Gerrold is much more than a Trek writer. I discovered that myself while reading about him. I'll give one thing to this mindless, slapdash reviewer from USA, however. He's right in that there's a lot in this book that many of us already know. But try finding an advice book on writing that doesn't repeat the sound advice of others. Then email me and tell me what planet it's on. Writing books are not about complete newness, they're about new slants on old ideas. Worlds of Wonder's greatness is about how Gerrold puts things--in his own, distinct voice.