For the Love of Letters: A 21st-Century Guide to the Art of Letter Writing

Okay, I liked this book half a star less than O'Shea's other book, Note to Self. I found it to be quite readable, and I enjoyed reading it. Like Note to Self, this book comes across almost more like a memoir than an instruction manual--she could've reasonably subtitled it "My Life in Letters." But readable as it was, I think it did fall down a bit on the how-to part, mostly because I ended up being more fascinated by the sample letters than the advice they were supposed to illustrate!

Oh, and another similarity to Note to Self: there's a section on erotic letters. Anyone thinking of buying this book for a young person or for someone who doesn't care for explicit sexual description, should look through the book before giving it away.

Samara O'Shea has been hard at work ever since her bungee jump out of 'O: The Oprah Magazine' as an intern into her very own zany and wildly popular foray into the ethereal media realm. Certain truisms are universal to all successful letter writing, and she recognizes that what she learned under that structure helped her evolve into a letter writer with interesting panache. Learning how author O'Shea writes letters might not guarantee success to all those aspiring writers out there; but she does offer constructive advice beyond the usual offerings in the plethora of how-to's on the market. She does this chapter by chapter, topic by topic.

Chapter one embraces what she calls gift letters. These are additionally broken down into love show more letters and erotic letters. Chapter two is titled letter therapy. Here she addresses both good-bye letters and what she calls flaming -tongue letters. Chapter three brings the return to sender type; made up of breakup, and unauthorized love letters. Letters of gratitude in chapter four follow, and then come the difficult to say letters such as apologies and sympathy letters in chapter five. Letters of change are tackled next in chapter six. She finishes chapter seven with business and recommendation letters.

The best part of 'For the Love of Letters...', is that it is written in O'Shea's own irrepressible voice with brief excerpts from her own personal life to illustrate her writing points; like when she used this letter written by a previous boyfriend.



" My Dearest Noodle,

I thought this card was hilarious. I bet they don't sell many " love you cousin" cards on V. day, except maybe in West Virginia. Anyway, I am sitting here foolishly trying to capture my feelings for you in this card. If I had a thousand cousins in love cards, I couldn't describe my feelings for you."

Take as a case in point the ones she used as examples of good-bye letters. One was Marie Antoinette's last letter to her sister moments before her beheading.

"Farewell, my good and tender sister, I hope that this letter may reach you. Do not forget me. I embrace you with all my heart as well as my poor children. My God! How it tears my heart to leave them forever. Farewell, Farewell!"

Another was from Lian de Pougy, an egotistical bisexual, whose letter to the love of her life saying good-bye, clearly demonstrates O'Shea's message that "the only absolute sentiment that they have to convey is "farewell,"

Pougy's words "I no longer believe, I no longer hope, I no longer love."

She used very colorful letters and applies straightforward rules and guidelines for those of us who are note takers. These letters will inspire readers to relate their own lives to the letters--- to discover what is universal in writing a great letter. O'Shea concludes each letters entry with author information, and suggestions of grammer. O'Shea does it all--- she entertains and informs and gives us our money's worth. I have no doubt her book will become a personal textbook on letter writing; as it is crammed with poignant, amusing, and even uncomfortable missives. This book will be a welcome addition to any family library. Beyond giving you great letters to read, O'Shea's letter writing guide will inspire what maybe some of the best and most revealing letters you will ever write.



O'Shea is the founder and editor of a letter - writing service.

http://www.letterlover.net/

Her writing has appeared in Women's Day Specials, Country Living, All You, HappenMag.com, and The Pittsburgh Magazine.



You can also find her here:

http://letterlover.gather.com/ show less

I started this book, then abandoned it, but went back to it. I think it is organized badly. I would have put the termination and resignation and kiss-off type letters at the end,. Perhaps they wanted to end the book on a positive note? There are some good tips for cover letters and some great stories about letters [a:Samara O'Shea|402676|Samara O'Shea|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg] has written. I think the author goes into her single status a bit too much, but otherwise the books is relatively entertaining, well written and useful. I think this would be a good reference book - one to refer to periodically.

Where this really shines is in breakup/apology notes. The rest of it is very well-worded common sense.

The topic caught my attention, since I like to write letters to penpals, but unfortunately the book is divided up into topics unrelated to my own personal letter writing. Others may find it more useful if they write lots of letters to the editors, complaint letters, etc.

A good read, the type of book you read once only. Has guides to writing various letters.