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I have to say that as I’ve read more and more books on writing I’ve come to believe that the best books on writing are not those written by writers (necessarily), but are those written by people of a particular sort of intelligence — a seemingly rare combination of observation and pattern-recognition matched with an ability for expressing their discoveries — who are associated in some way with the craft. It seems to be a reasonable expectation that the majority of these people would be writers, even great writers. Yet, the more I write, the more I discover that those who write fiction well do not necessarily know why they do so or how. Further, fiction writers are not necessarily great writers in other areas of written communication. So, I’ve long-since abandoned the following myths:

- good writers can teach good writing
- teachers are failed writers (or they’d be writing, of course)
- teachers are only good if they have produced great writing (I prefer to look at their students, if they’re willing to share that information)
- authors of wise books on writing make good teachers
- brilliant teachers write good books on writing.

Now, on to the review. This book is at the opposite end of the basic ‘usefulness’ spectrum from The Portable MFA. Over the years, I’ve come to accept (with some puzzlement) that not every writer desires to be a student of writing. For those of you for whom this is true, I envy you. You probably get far more done than I do. Still, I think that this particular book is one that every writer can own and find useful. It is, and I believe it will remain, one of the five books I would recommend that every writer own to keep hold of the reins of their creativity.

The 3 A.M. Epiphany: Uncommon writing exercises that transform your fiction by Brian Kiteley

Kiteley has done something particularly interesting in this book. He has partitioned both writing and life into categories and then into even smaller subjects in each category. (See the chapter listing after the jump.) Instead of telling you all about how to write or why to write or what to look for in life to make you a good writer, he’s included a little discussion of each subject at the beginning of each chapter and then leapt into the business at hand: assigning carefully scripted writing prompts in association with further discussion of why this particular prompt works and what it’s meant to develop in your writing.

I find The 3 A.M. Epiphany particularly useful because, with my attention-deficit issues, I struggle at times to focus on both writing and reading. This book is one I use with a handful of RPG dice that I roll to pick the exercise I’m going to do when I’m feeling scattered. They’re helpfully numbered, making it even easier. Even if you don’t read the whole thing — ever — each little exercise is a foray into understanding your own writing process and learning to draw out certain tools deliberately instead of hoping for them to come to hand as you write.

If you are going to use The 3 A.M. Epiphany as a larger resource, the chapters are divided so as to address issues that I’ve often found as common flaws in otherwise competent fiction. To me, this is another reason to buy this book. It’s so hard to identify what area of a piece of fiction is weak in a way that one can effectively communicate, and sometimes harder still to know how to make repairs or how to guide them. Issues like handling the passage of time, building a sense of history, or the art of description by omission are abstract and teaching them can be elusive. Kiteley’s blend of explanation, example, and exercise makes grasping — and learning to feel — those concepts a possibility.

I have to emphasize how effective and engaging and challenging I find Kiteley’s exercises. They are not long, with the suggested word-count being under 1000 words and sometimes under 500 words, but they are pointed. The 3 A.M. Epiphany is an excellent way not to waste your time if you are writing in addition to maintaining your alter-egos as SuperParent and Employee-of-the-Month. Learning to complete the task in the words allotted is just another way that using this book will improve your writing.

My sole complaint about this book is that it’s heteronormative. Well, Anah, you can’t have everything. To which I say, this is hardly EVERYTHING, and I demand it: not just as a queer writer but as a student of writing raised in a normative Western culture. For anyone striving to capture the scope of the human condition — not just those of us in this genre — the heteronormative, binary paradigm of human sexuality and relating is a stifling girdle on the imagination. Queerness is not some sparkling new concept. I bring up the heteronormativity because there is a chapter boldly titled Women and Men, which made my teeth hurt in its singular perspective.

I confess that I did not discover this little gem. The honor of that falls to my dear Dianne, who mentioned it a couple years ago, after she’d wisely purchased it. I bought it (she admitted sheepishly) because I was taken by the cover and the name. Aesthetically, this is a lovely little book with a matte indigo cover stamped with silver and smooth white pages printed in an attractive typeface. There is something about it that feels a bit like a modern spellbook, and that suits the magic of it perfectly.

You can purchase The 3 A.M. Epiphany through Amazon or order it through your local bookstore.

ETA: I have JUST discovered that Kiteley has a second book, The 4 A.M. Breakthrough out as of January 12, 2009. I’ve just ordered it and will be reviewing it later this year. *insert flappy-hands glee here*

CHAPTERS (and sample exercise title)
001 ~ Introduction
018 ~ Point of View #7 The Unstable Self
034 ~ Images #15 Two Images Separated At Birth
047 ~ Characters and Ways of Seeing #39 Letters From Inside The Story
066 ~ Women and Men #46 Intimacy
075 ~ Children and Childhood #57 Wrong Hall
085 ~ Conversation #67 Travesty
096 ~ Thought and Emotion #81 The Bunny Planet
112 ~ Biography and Autobiography #90 Funhouse Mirror
125 ~ Time #100 Landscape and Time
137 ~ History #108 Censorship
144 ~ Description #113 In the Belly of the Beast
158 ~ Sentences — Butting Up Against Each Other #123 The Music of Prose
172 ~ Other People’s Sentences #140 Jointly Held Story
189 ~ Play and Games #153 Dice
195 ~ Sports #159 The Seduction of Analogies
200 ~ Work #162 Gravediggers
206 ~ Humor #168 Incongruity
213 ~ Travel #177 Life as Text
228 ~ Internal Structure #188 The Circle
232 ~ Exercises for Stories in Progress #197 Embracing the Mystery