I started reading this book because of the recommendation from the last class I took. I’ve only read chapter 1 so far, but I’m already enjoying it. The chapter was about showing instead of telling. It was interesting to me because I actually enjoyed reading the passages of narrative summaries. However, the stories really did come alive when it was rewritten to include action happening. A quick example from me: Narrative summary–Janie was upset when she came home from school. Nothing seemed to go right. She wanted to talk to her mom about it but no one was home. Showing, not telling–Janie stomped into the house and slammed the door shut. She threw her backpack who-knows-where. “Mom!” she said. Nothing. “Where are you when I need you…” The examples in the book are more complex, and there are exercises at the end of the chapter where you try to fix scenes yourself. The chapter notes that sometimes narrative summary is best for certain situations. The other thing that stood out to me was that you don’t need to express yourself twice, once in dialog, and then for more effect in your description afterwards. For example, if your dialogue makes it clear that the person speaking is upset, you don’t need to then write that the character was upset, after the dialogue. By the way, the writers of this book using The Great Gatsby for examples was a great way of showing, not telling.