Amanda Bennett
Pulitzer Prize-winning author, investigative journalist, and editor
Book Recommendations:
Recommended by Amanda Bennett
“Jack Hart is one of the country's foremost writing coaches. Generations of writers found their voices, found their stories, found their heroes, heroines and villains in the news. Under his leadership the whole news industry learned a new way of connecting with its readers. I know I did. The lessons he teaches are about storytelling, structuring, pacing, tension and conflict. These lessons are perhaps even more important now in a digital age that sometimes forgets that—without a story to tell—words, videos, graphs, graphics, emails, alerts and news bulletins are just so much noise.” (from Amazon)
Jack Hart, master writing coach and former managing editor of the Oregonian, has guided several Pulitzer Prize–winning narratives to publication. Since its publication in 2011, his book Storycraft has become the definitive guide to crafting narrative nonfiction. This is the book to read to learn the art of storytelling as embodied in the work of writers such as David Grann, Mary Roach, Tracy Kidder, and John McPhee. In this new edition, Hart has expanded the book’s range to delve into podcasting and has incorporated new insights from recent research into storytelling and the brain. He has also added dozens of new examples that illustrate effective narrative nonfiction. This edition of Storycraft is also paired with Wordcraft, a new incarnation of Hart’s earlier book A Writer’s Coach, now also available from Chicago.