Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them by Francine Prose. Harper Collins, 2006. 288 pages.
Francine Prose is a lover of books who found an eternal literature classroom by reading the masters of prose. She is also a terrific writer who uses engaging anecdotes and examples to cover such topics as character, dialogue, and narration, as well as the more technical matters of paragraph development, sentence structure, and word choice. She spins one interesting yarn after another through references of great literary passages. In the process, the author proves that command of language and inventiveness of human elements surpass plot in captivating readers. The subtitle of the book rings true: either the bibliophile or the neophyte author will benefit from reading it.
