Sequel volume to Write What You Don’t Know!
Dear interested reader(s), I just had some very welcome news from my publisher, Continuum Books in New York. After a successful peer review process they have accepted my proposal for a sequel volume to Write What You Don’t Know. We are in discussion over the title, but right now it is: Structure is Pleasure, learning screenwriting through case studies. I have a number of other writing projects on my plate at the moment, including a spec screenplay and a big chapter on screenwriting history for a forthcoming book from Rutgers UP, so the new book won’t appear for a while yet. I’ll keep you posted on this site of course.
Happy day!
‘Write What You Don’t Know’ adopted for Santa Clara University screenwriting classes
I just had this welcome piece of news from a colleague at Santa Clara. I hope the students down the peninsula find it useful and wish them well in all their script projects!
Write What You Don’t Know gets a Chinese edition!
I just learned from Continuum that they have sold the publishing rights for Write What You Don’t Know in mainland China. The book will be translated into “Chinese (simplified) language” and sold under the imprint of PHEI (The Publishing House of Electronics Industry.
Projected date of publication for this edition will be May 2013.
Sounds great – although how they will translate and cope with the style and the bad jokes I have no idea.
Good luck, you unknown Chinese translator, I think you are going to need it!
New review of Write What You Don’t Know
Kathy Cabrera, an Atlanta based screenwriting teacher, was kind enough to write a short review. Expect to see it up on Amazon etc. in the near future:
For the aspiring screenwriter and seasoned – but blocked – writer alike, there are words of wisdom in Julian Hoxter’s book, Write What You Don’t Know that will help you. Regardless of how new to screenwriting you are, or what particular phase of your draft you’re in, Hoxter’s chapter-by-chapter manual makes the craft accessible with information when and where you need it. Case in point, I’ve written over six scripts and hold a screenwriting M.F.A. from UCLA, but it feels like moving a mountain to rev up the energy I need just to start the months-long process of writing a new spec script. When I started a new project recently and was lacking in motivation, I flipped to Chapter 2: “Screenwriting: The Hardest Easy Thing You Will Ever Do.” The chapter got my butt in gear (aka in the chair to burn up some pages!) and helped me re-focus in that crucial brainstorm phase as to what the story was that I really needed (versus wanted) to tell.”
‘Write What You Don’t Know’ in San Jose Mercury News
We got a little mention in their books column on December 31st 2011.
Another photo competition entry: ooh look, bunnies!
If you have read Write What You Don’t Know, you’ll know why this is an awesome photo. Now where’s my acid…
Write What You Don’t Know now available on Kindle
It’s cheaper, it’s digital…er, it’s significantly more Amazonian than previously. Carry it with you and read it anywhere your Starfleet Tricorder accompanies you. All this and the bunnies come with!
Also you can now get a preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside” function. Very swish.
Another Photo Competition entry
"Take the manual bowling, take it bowling!" (With apologies to Camper Van Beethoven)
Julian Hoxter Author Event at University Press Books in Berkeley, CA.
University Press Books, Continuum Press and the
2430 Arts Alliance invite you to join
Julian Hoxter
in conversation with
Joseph McBride
for a reading and discussion of his new book
Write What You Don’t Know: An Accessible Manual for Screenwriters
Thursday, 10 November 2011, 6:00 – 7:30 PM
Write What You Don’t Know is a friendly manual for aspiring screenwriters. It encourages you to move beyond your comfort zones in search of stories. We all write what we know – how could we not? Writing what you don’t know and doing it in an informed and imaginative way is what makes the process worthwhile.
Hoxter draws on his wealth of experience teaching young film students to offer help with every aspect of the writing process, including how we come up with ideas in the first place. Light hearted and full of insight into the roundabout way film students approach their scripts, it also discusses the important issues like the difference between stories and plots and what your characters should be doing in the middle of act two. Write What You Don’t Know contains examples and case studies from a wide range of movies, both mainstream and alternative such as The Virgin Spring, Die Hard, The Ipcress File, For The Birds, (500) Days of Summer, Juno, Up In The Air, Knocked Up and Brick.
Julian Hoxter is the Screenwriting Coordinator and Assistant Professor of Screenwriting in the Cinema Department of San Francisco State University. He is an award winning educator and filmmaker whose films have been shown in festivals around the world. He has taught screenwriting and filmmaking in the US and the UK for over 15 years.
UNIVERSITY PRESS BOOKS
2430 BANCROFT WAY (between Telegraph & Dana), BERKELEY
