Drawing on the Power of Resonance in Writing: Million Dollar Writing Series

4.4 | 146 ratings

Price: 6.08

Last update: 10-06-2024

About this item

All successful writers use resonance to enhance their stories by drawing power from stories that came before, by resonating with their audiences' experiences, and by resonating within their own works. In this book, you'll learn exactly what resonance is and how to use it to make your stories more powerful. You'll see how it is used in literature and other art forms, and how one writer, J. R. R. Tolkien, mastered it in his work.

C. Jack

POWERFUL Technique! I agree...this book is pure BRILLIANCE! Why HASN'T anyone else written about this?

Reviewed in the United States on February 3, 2013

Leave it to David Farland to expound on not just a concept but a technique to create familiarity quickly with the reader...a technique which inherently draws upon the 'connections' they have with other works. This book explains how you can use that CONSCIOUSLY in crafting your books, and how that feeling of familiarity can lead to more people reading your book.

I found it interesting that, even if you believe you are breaching new ground, creating new worlds, you should use the power of resonance to subconsciously drive it. His exposition of Tolkien's use of resonance, and how meticulously he crafted the tenants of his world, were mind-boggling. This did way more than put James Cameron's 4 years of 'design' of the nuances of the Avatar world into proper perspective. Tolkien took over a decade to design his...including the languages of his dominant races.

After I read this, I decided to check out David's book, 'On My Way to Paradise', as a curiosity. However by the time I got 1/4 of the way through the SECOND PAGE, I had to buy it. The use of resonance, foreshadowing and a dynamic opening -- one that was suggestive but not in your face -- drew me in in SO many ways...it just had me saying, "I've GOT to learn how to do that!" So I ordered it to dissect how he did it (I ordered the hardcopy version).

I own over a dozen books on crafting fiction and none of them talk about this technique (of creating resonance)...a technique that, for the first time in my life, had me buying an author previously unknown to me, after reading just over ONE PAGE of their book.

Get this book if you want to improve your sample; if you want people hooked (quickly) on the story you weave. It'll make you a more powerful (and successful) writer.

Daniel Burton

Farland Nails It.

Reviewed in the United States on July 7, 2014

Writing about a book on writing is perhaps an odd challenge. On the one hand, I read the book because I wanted to become a better writer. On the other hand, I’m reviewing the book, telling where the author (of a book on writing, if you recall) has succeeded or failed at their attempt.
Fortunately, I face no such problems with David Farland’s Drawing on the Power of Resonance in Writing. Indeed, there is little I can say to criticize the bite-sized book. In a short time, it has become one of my favorite selections on the writing, one to which I expect I will return again and again in coming years.
A book on writing by a famous writer seems almost cliché. A few pull it off with great success (think On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King), for a more obvious example), while others (which, perhaps, need no mention at all) fail miserably to be little more than regurgitation of typical advice mixed with anecdotes from the writers own career.
Farland’s books on writing (I’m reading another of his, also, albeit slower as I try to apply it) are spot on, and this one is fast, to the point, and full of relevant examples. Farland’s thesis is that by writing using what resonates with readers–what’s already out there in their in the ether, so to speak–writers can pull readers in faster and with more success than by inventing something from scratch. While he cites many examples, the one that he draws on most liberally is that of J.R.R. Tolkein. Tolkein’s use of imagery, language, setting, and plot delved deep into readers’ subconsciousness and resonated with them in ways they may not have explicitly noticed.
In turn, nearly every successful fantasy since has built on the foundation that Tolkein built, and it is to him that most look for the template. Even Robert Jordan’s fourteen volume Wheel of Time series, opening with The Eye of the World, draws on scenes, characters, and even creature names (to say nothing of maps and place names) that are more than reminiscent of Tolkein.
And there’s nothing wrong with it, says Farland. On the contrary, finding what resonates with your target audience, and writing it into your fiction is his recommendation.
It’s a fascinating suggestion, and the more I think about it, the more I realize that while Farland may be laying it out in new terms, it’s not unlike what any professor of literature might suggest in a survey course of fiction through the ages. Thomas C. Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines is an example that comes to mind. It’s the best writers that are able to use what we believe and see in the world, draw on common symbols and events, and weave them together into a new story, or in a new setting, or with new problems. It’s not plagiarism, but something more: creation, using the fabric of our experience.
As Oscar Wilde might summarize it, “Good writers borrow. Great writers steal.”
Resonance, says Farland, is just that. It’s drawing on what’s already there–whether you want to call that borrowing or outright theft–to create a story that readers feel deeper than the words on the page, rooted in experience and knowledge they bring to the story before they even open the book.
If you want your story to last, make it resonate.

Game changer for writers!

Reviewed in the United States on August 3, 2024

A quick but powerful read. His insights on what story resonance is and its history changed how I think about story creation and development. Helps you see how every story fits in one resonance or another and how you can maximize your story’s potential. This is a book I’m definitely glad I own.

Edward D Hall

Every aspiring writer should read this

Reviewed in the United States on March 30, 2013

This week I picked up David Farland's book "Drawing on the Power of Resonance in Writing". I remember talking about resonance in physics and how sounds resonate with other sounds creating a more enjoyable sound than those that don't. I never thought about resonance from a writers prospective.
Having read this book I find it intimidating so much I never thought about. It has got me rethinking about all the names in my fantasy series, I'll likely have to re think them. There is much more to resonance than just the names. How does it relate to our lives, to other things we've read, our loves and fears, etc. he even pointed out the importance of making a cover resonance with other covers. He uses an artist that has created covers for some of the great fantasy writers this even his covers brings resonance to readers of these other books.
Throughout the book he points out how Tolkien use resonance with his words, the story itself and even in the imagery. Tolkien was a master of resonance there is much to learn from his work.
I must confess I never read "The Lord of the Rings". I read "The Hobbit" which I enjoyed I just never got into "The Lord of the Rings" I did read several other fantasy books and played Dungeons and Dragons for years even became a Dungeon Master. Much of my fantasy world comes from ADND (Advanced Dungeons and Dragons) you could say I refined my world through my Role Playing.
There is much for a novice writer such as myself to learn from this work. I strongly recommend this to all inspiring writers. I wonder if this would have helped me with me reports in collage.

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