Book review: “Story” by Robert McKee
Don’t be fooled by the fact that the subtitle of this book includes the word “screenwriting.” This book is for anybody who wants to understand storytelling at a deep, technical level.
It covers story structure, down to the level of beat. Idealist, pessimist, and ironist controlling ideas. Character development and inner, personal, and extra-personal conflicts. How to handle the inciting incident. Designing acts and scenes. Selecting your cast of characters. And all with great examples from famous films you’d likely seen.
If I were creating my own masterclass on creative writing, this would be one of the core books.
I give it 5 stars and 13 dog-ears and 4 Post-its.
In Story, there are two concepts that were particularly helpful to me as I’ve been writing my sci-fi trilogy …