Best books on how to write?

"The Writer's Little Helper" by James V. Smith, Jr. I bought this book two weeks ago and absolutely love it! I have 15 or so yellow sticky tabs poking from the edges where the author has made a point. It's got great stuff in it.

Bill

"The Making of a Story" by Alice LaPlante  A good reference.for when a reviewer uses a term you don't understand. Stumped by dramatic irony, a dead metaphor? Difference between first person personal and first person observer? Gives not only definitions but good examples.
"The Passionate, Accurate Story" by Carol Bly. So good I took it to my writing group to loan and never saw it again.
A very short story "How to Become a Writer"  by Lorrie Moore. Easily available to read on line. A primer on comedy.
I judge the value of books on writing by seeing if the author can write a good story herself. LaPlante, Bly, and Moore all pass this test.
John Matthews

Oops--I got off the topic. I have read a lot of books explaining how to write, but in the end, the only way to become a good writer is with practice, practice, practice. That's why we belong to tnbw. The books are a jumping-off point, and not everyone's advice works for all of us. I never got any practical help from Steven King's book, although it was well-written, which sets a good example, I guess.

Find a few books and read them, but don't feel you have to follow anyone's advice to the letter. And don't expect instant success, no matter what they claim.

Thank you, all.

Hold on, Jack and JP,  If the writing is so bad that it makes you miss the story, then it's not a good story.  If the story is so good that you don't notice the bad writing, then it's not bad writing.

I just finished reading a series of sixteen (yes--sixteen!) highly entertaining adventure romances. All the while I wished the writer had tried to use a little better grammar and sentence construction. I noticed it, and although the stories were fun, the reading experience was diminished. It just seems to me that a writer who has published--and sold to the public--sixteen books should know better. The worst part? In every book's acknowledgements, the author thanked the editor profusely.

The author should have done better, cared more. The editor should be ashamed to be named in association with such work. I call flimflam, bamboozle and swindle to palm off on the paying public poorly written work.

Micheal O'Donahue's "How to Write Good."  Best advise ever--if you don't know how to end a story, have all the characters run over by a truck.  If it's a story about characters who drive trucks, have them run over by a big truck.

Or have a volcano explode in the middle of everything--oh no, wait--that's been done! How about a towering inferno? Or maybe a ship gets upended at sea, or dinosaurs take over an island and pick off the characters, one by one?

It seems there are no new ideas. You just have to tell it your way.