Several Short Sentences About Writing

By: Verlyn Klinkenborg

Narrated by: Verlyn Klinkenborg

Most of what you think you know about writing is useless. It's the harmful debris of your education - a mixture of half-truths, myths, and false assumptions that prevents you from writing well. Drawing on years of experience as a writer and teacher of writing, Verlyn Klinkenborg offers an approach to writing that will change the way you work and think. There is no gospel, no orthodoxy, no dogma in this book. What you'll find here isn't the way to write. Instead, you'll find a way to clear your mind of illusions about writing and discover how you write.

Several Short Sentences About Writing is a book of first steps and experiments. They will revolutionize the way you think and perceive, and they will change forever the sense of your own authority as a writer. This is a book full of learning, but it's also a book full of unlearning - a way to recover the vivid, rhythmic, poetic sense of language you once possessed.

An indispensable and unique book that will give you a clear understanding of how to think about what you do when you write and how to improve the quality of your writing.

©2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc. (P)2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Highly recommended.

Great book and narrator. I highly recommend it for anyone interested in learning how to write concisely.

Valuable resource for writers

Five days ago I was watching a VLOG of two authors discussing the following quote attributed to Ernest Hemmingway. “You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.”

That same day I was scrolling though my Audible library and saw I had a copy of Several Short Sentences about Writing. While I don’t believe in coincidences, the timing between the VLOG and finding this book waiting in my Audible library did appear interesting.

Listening to Verlyn Klinkenborg narrating his book felt like I was sitting in a classroom with a professor who knew his topic and delivered the material with an enjoyable sense of humor.

As a novice fiction writer, I found the material to be not only interesting but very valuable. Especially based on the Hemmingway quote – writing is all about writing one sentence followed by many more.

A great listen!

This book was worth the listen. Great voice. Great message. I learned so much! I will say some of the exercises would be easier with the physical book. I will look at getting a copy.

Slow

Author made his point well. It’ll take me a few listens to get it. It may take a few more listens and a lot of writing.
I wonder if he could’ve read the book slower.
Maybe he could add some longer pauses.

Unlearn What You Have Learned (About Sentences)

This is essentially an entire English class in the form of a book, specifically focused on word choice and sentence structure, and pushing against all the lessons we were all taught in school. That may be good or bad, depending on what you’re looking for.