How to Write a Story by Kate Messner, Mark Siegel
Published by Chronicle Books on July 7, 2020
ISBN: 1452156662
Pages: 36
Genres: Realistic Fiction
Format: Picture Book Nonfiction
Goodreads

Need a basic primer for elementary students? This would make a great anchor text for students who just don’t know where to start or what to do next when they feel stalled. Is this a complete writing manual? No. Is this useful for framing creative writing and mini-lessons? Absolutely. 

It reads like a story of someone telling the reader ten basic steps in the writing process, beginning with collecting ideas (lots of them!) and almost ending with sharing your story. It says that sharing your story is not the end of writing, as then it’s time to “…start searching for a new idea that wants to be written…”

Colorful illustrations follow a young writer as she explores and considers many ways to start and continue her story. Some pages show parts of a hand-written story; others show imagination bubbles where the writer is thinking. 

Even though the audience, at first glance, seems to be children, any age could use this as a basic framework that encourages thinking, exploring, and discovery of stories that want to be written. This could also be used as a companion book to Messner’s 2015 “How to Read a Story.”

Reviewed by Lynn Mayer, Retired Librarian, Old Town Elementary School, Old Town