How to Grow a Novel: The Most Common Mistakes Writers Make and How to Overcome Them - Hardcover

A guide to writing a novel by one of the most popular writing instructors in America describes common pitfalls in writing a novel, showing how to avoid them and offering many tips on how to improve one's writing skills.

In 1999, a distinguished panel convened by the Modern Library published a list of the 100 best nonfiction works of the century. Two books edited by Sol Stein were in the top half of that list. Stein was in his twenties when his play Napoleon won the Dramatists Alliance award as "the best full-length play of 1953." He is the author of nine novels, which have made bestseller lists as far away as Moscow. He is also an anthologized poet, the author of nonfiction books, screenplays, and TV dramas, and the creator of the award-winning computer software WritePro®, as well as FirstAid for Writers® and FictionMaster®. Webster Schott, writing in the New York Times Book Review, said of Stein's novel The Magician, "Beautiful and gripping. I cannot recall a novel of this type with greater pleasure." On another occasion, the Times said, "If you bury yourself in a Sol Stein book while walking, you'll walk into a wall."

Stein has lectured on creative writing at Columbia, Iowa, UCLA, and the University of California at Irvine, which presented him with the Distinguished Instructor Award in 1993. His on-line columns appear on America Online, the Writers Club on the World Wide Web, and elsewhere on the Internet.