Million Dollar Outlines by David Farland - Book Review and Giveaway

Jill Williamson is a chocolate loving, daydreaming, creator of kingdoms. She writes weird books for teens in lots of weird genres like, fantasy (Blood of Kings trilogy), science fiction (Replication), and dystopian (The Safe Lands trilogy). Find Jill on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or on her author website.

This past August I had the privilege of taking a class from writing instructor David Farland. I filled at least a dozen pages in my notebook during that class. The man breathes wisdom, and I did my best to jot it all down.

Then, a few weeks later, I got to see him again at Salt Lake Comic Con. I had him sign two copies of Million Dollar Outlines. One for me. And one for you.


Here's a picture of me with David and the precious autographed book that I'll be giving away in today's blog post.

Here is a little bit about the book:
Bestselling author David Farland has taught dozens of writers who have gone on to staggering literary success, including such #1 New York Times Bestsellers as Brandon Mull (Fablehaven), Brandon Sanderson (Wheel of Time), James Dashner (The Maze Runner) and Stephenie Meyer (Twilight). In this book, Dave teaches how to analyze an audience and outline a novel so that it can appeal to a wide readership, giving it the potential to become a bestseller. The secrets found in his unconventional approach will help you understand why so many of his authors go on to prominence.


And a peek at the table of contents:

Section 1: What Makes a Bestselling Story?

        Introduction: Writing as a Form of Entertainment
        What is Entertainment?
        What Is a Story, and How Does it Work?
        On Story Types Versus Shapes
        Defining a Million-Dollar Property
        Why Do Research for Becoming a Bestseller?
        Audience Analysis: Novels
        Using Emotional Draws
        Pulling it All Together

Section 2: Identify the Elements that Help You Plot Your Story
        Elements of a Story
        Brainstorming Your Settings
        Building Characters
        Finding Themes in Your Tale
        Novel Plotting Tools

Section 3: The Plotting Process
        Promising Starts to a Novel
        Story Middles
        Ending Your Story Well
        Writing a Million Dollar Outline


What I thought of the book:

This book got me excited from the start. David Farland talked about entertainment and why people read popular fiction. He talked about story structure. Things like ... 

-Stories are strongest when they start with some sort of mystery that leaves the reader asking, "Why?" 
-The importance of having high stakes. 
-Letting the hero go through at least three try-fail cycles as he attempts to resolve the problem. 
-How to suck in your audience. 

All good stuff. The kind of stuff that can help you create a story that appeals to the masses. Though, based on the title, I would have liked to have seen at least one example of a million dollar outline in the book. A very small portion of the book is actually about outlining. But this is the way David Farland teaches. He has discussions. He talks about craft, the industry, his experiences, books that did things right, books that failed. It's like you're sitting down with him, talking over lunch. So while reading this book might not leave you walking away with a million dollar outline, you will be inspired and excited to get back to your story and apply all that you have learned.

Have you ever read this book? If so, what did you think about it? What other books on outlining fiction have you read that helped you?

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