A week doesn’t pass that someone doesn’t write me and ask what books I recommend on learning how to write well.

And I never fail to go to a conference and not meet a writer who thrives on how-to-write books, with a library of two dozen or more.

To them all, I preach this: The best book to learn from is one already published, successful in its own right, in the genre you wish to pursue. Take that baby and read it. Then start over and dissect it. Underline, highlight, write in the margins, and dog-ear those pages. Cross through what you didn’t like. Circle the breath-catching phrases. Underline and star the sentences you wish you’d written.

Nothing beats the doing. Nothing beats learning from those who have gone before you. Nothing beats seeing greatness and backing into how it came to be.

Your best instruction book isn’t a how-to book. It’s a how-it-was-done book. And any author worth their clout can’t recall a how-to book that shaped their writing more than having read the classics, the best-sellers, and the popular books that made them go WOW in reading them.

That said, I am reading How to Write a Sentence-and How to Read One, by Stanley Fish. “Fish marvels at the adeptness of finely crafted morsels, giving readers an instant play-by-play.”  Not a book on how to write, but a book that dissects beautiful sentences already out in the world, teaching the how and why of their beauty.