My favourite nonfiction book is James Moffett’s Points of Departure. Moffett has collected 58 of his favourite examples of short narrative nonfiction to\u00a0display\u00a0five specific forms: interaction, notation, recollection, investigation and cogitation. The examples stem from 1919 until 1983. Each is a gem worth reading.<\/p>\n
His first example, the Coca Cola Grove Press Letters, is by far my favourite. It outlines letters between two corporate executives. The best\u00a0sentence summarizes the entire issue.<\/p>\n
Accordingly, we have instructed all our salesmen to notify bookstores that whenever a customer comes in and asks for a copy of a Diary of a Harlem Schoolteacher they should request the sales personnel to make sure that what the customer wants is the book, rather than a Coke.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
This book is the best way to understand how to define and structure narrative nonfiction of almost any type. Every story in the book also tells a very concise entertaining story while teaching writers to structure their work. It also reminds us how timeless notable\u00a0nonfiction\u00a0can be.<\/p>\n
Story: Consider nonfiction as an act of creation<\/h2>\n
Moffett chose his five forms of nonfiction based on what a writer does to create them. As he says in the introduction:<\/p>\n
Whether amateur or professional, a prose writer does one of four things to generate the material of a composition. You recollect, investigate, invent or cogitate.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The fifth form is interaction, and includes letters.<\/p>\n
Structure: Purpose provides structure<\/h2>\n
By letting authors’ works stand on their own, Moffett makes the point that purpose defines structure. His wide-ranging collection of narrative nonfiction samples range from two to ten pages long, but none takes even one word longer than necessary to make their very complicated points.<\/p>\n
Style: Using Structure to Make a Point<\/h2>\n
Other than an eight-page introduction to the book and from\u00a0two sentences to two paragraphs prior to each sample, Moffett relies on selection and structure to make his case. This book is a great primer on structuring nonfiction prose.<\/p>\n
Sound: Diverse clarity<\/h2>\n
No story in this book reads like any other, yet every one is well-written and clear.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My favourite nonfiction book is James Moffett’s Points of Departure. Moffett has collected 58 of his favourite examples of short narrative nonfiction to\u00a0display\u00a0five specific forms: interaction, notation, recollection, investigation and cogitation. The examples stem from 1919 until 1983. Each is a gem worth reading. His first example, the Coca Cola Grove Press Letters, is by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18448,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_wp_convertkit_post_meta":{"form":"-1","landing_page":"0","tag":"0","restrict_content":"0"},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Points of Departure","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[843],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book-reviews","post-wrapper","thrv_wrapper"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2buQs-4sg","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":17148,"url":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/reference-books-writing\/","url_meta":{"origin":17128,"position":0},"title":"Improve your Craft with a Writing Reference Book","author":"Tracey Arial","date":"January 26, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Are you a word nerd? 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