Review of Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott by Jeremy D Vance

This bestselling book was a bit of a disappointment for me. The best takeaways I received were two points. First, the bird by bird illustration demonstrated the need to focus on writing one thing at a time, rather than becoming overwhelmed by the thought of a whole book. Second, the advice to ignore the two different voices in your head is spot on as well. On one side, you have the voice tearing down your writing and on the other, the voice that says your writing could never be better. Instead, focus on your writing or these voices will mess you up.

On the disappointing side, I felt Lamott overly focused on her thoughts and feelings to being a distraction from her writing advice. Granted, I’ve read a number of straight writing craft books so being pushed out of the rut could’ve been a little jolting to me as she writes about her life. Yet, perfecting my writing is what I wanted more than learning her particular likes and dislikes.

Also, I had given up on reading more but decided to give Lamott one more chance. Instead, she blindsided me with an offensive illustration. Now I haven’t spoken about it on here, but I am a person of faith and what she quoted just made me throw the book down in disgust. While she also claimed to be a person of faith, I had put up with a number of things to get to this point, but this quote made me put down the book forever.

I don’t recommend this book even though it is a bestseller. Rather, it’s best left alone.

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