How to Tell a Great Story - Aneeta Sundararaj, Author

How to Tell a Great Story – Review by Martha A. Cheves, Author of Stir, Laugh, Repeat and Think With Your Taste Buds – Desserts

‘The art of storytelling is not just about standing before a whole lot of people and saying the first thing that pops into your head.  It is about communicating your thoughts, ideas and vision to people in an effective manner.  It is about sharing your opinion with someone else.  It is about recording your own history for future generations.’

When I first started reading How to Tell A Great Story I thought to myself “I write cookbooks so this book won’t pertain to me.”  Wrong!  This is one of the most informative books I’ve ever read pertaining to writing and that’s all forms of writing as well as speaking.  By including speaking I want to point out that no matter what your topic, when you stand in front of someone you are a “story teller.”  Whenever you start a conversation you perform all of the steps of telling a story.  You have a theme or topic.  There is a purpose in what you are saying and your conversation will have at least one character.    How well your conversation, story or presentation is presented is determined by how strongly you emit your theme, purpose and characters.  And this is what Aneeta Sundararaj will teach you in her book How to Tell a Great Story.  She shows how to effectively make the theme the essence of the story.  How to get the purpose of the story across to your audience.  How to set up your settings using smell, taste, feelings, hearing and sight.  How to build character within your characters.  But most importantly she will help you understand ‘why’ you wrote or want to write your story. 

This author takes it even further with her explanation of when, how and if you should use slang, swearing and clichés.  The use of punctuation – what to use, when and where.  And to wrap it all up she supplies the forms that can be used for your research which is a vital part of your writing.  No one wants to hear someone talk about a subject that they know nothing about.  All-in-all, this is a book that should not only be used by writers of all genres but also as a study book for corporate presentations, teachers of all school ages and maybe a pastor now and then.  I write cookbooks but I will be referring back to this for my own writings.