Dave Wolverton (1957–2022)

I'm well aware of the irony in my writing a review of a book about outlining. Or even reading one, for that matter, since I'm pretty much an inveterate "discovery" writer (aka "pantser"). I bought a copy of this ebook to help out when the author's son was in an accident, and I wanted to contribute to their medical costs, the state of such things for writers being generally terrible south of the border. It took me quite a while to read it because I had it on my smartphone, and read it show more generally in short bursts while waiting in lines and offices.

However, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that even for a non-outliner like me, this book has some solid advice to impart. As well as dealing with the nitty-gritty of novel outlining, Farland has a lot of good points to make about evaluating the character relationships in your fledgling novel, incorporating emotional "beats", and finding ways to improve every scene. The writing is smooth and friendly, and uses many real-world examples to illustrate points. For both aspiring and intermediate authors, I highly recommend it even if you're not a fan of outlines; you'll likely find advice inside to help you take your writing up a notch. show less

Disclaimer: I am not much of a fantasy fan, in the ordinary way of things. I find Tolkien moralistic, and anything that smacks of elves and dwarves mostly insufferable; I abominate Harry Potter, and have managed to entirely avoid Game of Thrones. Nor are there any other of the endless fantasy series around of which I am a breathless follower. I like SF, in principle, but find it is often disappointing in execution. I do admire Philip K. Dick, Bradbury, Neil Gaiman, Pratchett and some show more others.

My expectations for this volume were not especially high, but I am happy to say that they were easily exceeded. Everything in here is worth reading. The selection is varied and (almost) impeccable; each piece is artful, well executed, free of claptrap, thought-provoking, and obviously the product of an interesting and original mind, not bound to the conventions of any particular genre. Each piece grabs holder of the reader, as it should, within the first few sentences. And, in general, they do not overstay their welcomes. The accompanying art is appropriately luminous.

A few niggling criticisms: Michael Panter's "Lilt of a Lark" is marvellously inventive, verbally, but the action drags a little. J. A. Becker's "For the Federation" is too rock-em, sock-em for my tastes, but it is saved (almost) by the ending, which is worth hanging on for. The final piece, Lazarus Black's "Psychic Poker", is the only one that is a near-dud, nebulous, self-important and not especially funny. Everything else is pretty rewarding material.

Well, I should add that the pieces by the headliners, Herbert and Anderson et al. can be safely skipped, unless you are deeply into SF history and apocrypha. And the L. Ron Hubbard piece is, viewed through modern eyes, dated, stale and predictable to the point of being almost unreadable. It is hard to believe it was at one time considering ground-breaking. Still, I have no problem giving five stars to the whole collection. If there are another 37 volumes like this in the series, that is a lot of reading to catch up on. show less

Bit of a mixes bag as you might expect. A couple of stinkers, some good ones, but nothing that really moves me. The best are Barbara Lund's Sixers, exciting and dramatic and set in a world I want to know more about; The Skin of My Mother, by Erik Lynd, spooky and unexpected; the Battle of Donasi by Elaine Midcoh, which is elegant and sensible; and Kristine Kathryn Rusch's The Museum of Modern Warfare, which is well paced and set against a background of a fascinating future. The worst were show more Emma Washburn's Hemingway and Brittany Rainsdon's Half-Breed, neither of which I could finish because they were verbose and juvenile The rest were fairly nondescript but made me feel like maybe I could enter this competition because I'm not a great writer but I'm as good as these guys. So that's worth half a star at least! show less

After 30 years I finally bit the bullet and read a Writers of the Future book, and I was pleasantly surprised. All the new writers showcased here provided excellent work. I was especially impressed by Megan E. O'Keefe, Paul Eckheart, and Timothy Jordan, but really - all the new works are quite good. There are also stories by veterans L. Ron Hubbard, Orson Scott Card, and Mike Resnick. The Card & Resnick are quite good; the Hubbard is absolute dreck - a real blight on the rest of the book.

I show more hadn't been aware of the "Illustrators of the Future" aspect to the contest. The illustrations included here are quite good and generally complement the story well.

Aside from the Hubbard story, my only criticism of the book is the "About the Author" and "About the Illustrator" pages. They really make an otherwise polished and substantive book feel like amateur hour.

Overall, I'd recommend the book and am now interested in reading other entries in the series. show less