I’ve read many books about the storytelling craft, almost all of which focus on writing fiction. And while I’m not a fiction author, I’ve found that these books provide the best sources of strategies and techniques for planning, writing, and editing nonfiction stories of the kind that I create.

One such book that I recently discovered offers the most systematic and comprehensive methodology for analyzing and improving stories that I’ve ever seen. It’s called, The Story Grid: What Good Editors Know, and it’s by Shawn Coyne, a 25-year veteran of the publishing industry who has worked with hundreds of authors as editor, co-author, publisher, or agent. 

In The Story Grid, Coyne has codified everything he knows about writing and editing great stories. He’s used his methodology — which he developed over the course of his career — to take hundreds of raw manuscripts to A-level published fiction and nonfiction. Books that he has edited and published have generated more than $150 million in sales in North America alone.

In this episode, I’m very pleased to have Shawn take us through how The Story Grid works, and how you can apply it to your own fiction or narrative non-fiction stories.

He also speaks about his publishing venture, Black Irish Press, which he manages with his long-time business partner Steven Pressfield, the noted author of many books of fiction and non-fiction, including The War of Art, which Shawn edited.

This is a longer episode than usual but I’m confident you’ll get a lot of practical strategies for improving your stories from Shawn. 

Be sure to check out the show notes to this episode where you can find the links to Shawn’s blog, his books, and his website for Black Irish Press over at writewithimpact.com/episode19.

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