Join Our Moore's Lore Media Book Club

Improve your storytelling skills through reading and discussion

All of us at Moore’s Lore Media LOVE to read and write but being spread across four countries we don’t get much chance to bond, which is why we’re forming a book club. It’s not only a chance for us to improve our storytelling skills and knowledge, but also a reason to put time in the calendar to share different perspectives and discuss something other than our immediate work priorities.

Our plan is to read one book a month and discuss it on the last Friday of that month starting last week with ‘The Science of Storytelling: Why Stories Make Us Human And How To Tell Them Better’ by Will Storr. Here’s the blurb…

The compelling, groundbreaking guide to creative writing that reveals how the brain responds to storytelling, based on the wildly popular creative writing class.

Stories shape who we are. They drive us to act out our dreams and ambitions and mold our beliefs. Storytelling is an essential part of what makes us human. So, how do master storytellers compel us? In The Science of Storytelling, award-winning writer and acclaimed teacher of creative writing Will Storr applies dazzling psychological research and cutting-edge neuroscience to our myths and archetypes to show how we can write better stories, revealing, among other things, how storytellers—and also our brains—create worlds by being attuned to moments of unexpected change.

Will Storr’s superbly chosen examples range from Harry Potter to Jane Austen to Alice Walker, Greek drama to Russian novels to Native American folk tales, King Lear to Breaking Bad to children’s stories. With sections such as “The Dramatic Question,” “Creating a World,” and “Plot, Endings, and Meaning,” as well as a practical, step-by-step appendix dedicated to “The Sacred Flaw Approach,” The Science of Storytelling reveals just what makes stories work, placing it alongside such creative writing classics as John Yorke’s Into the Woods: A Five-Act Journey into Story and Lajos Egri’s The Art of Dramatic Writing.

The author, Will Storr, even has a TEDx Talk.

In December we’ll be tackling ‘Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence’ by Max Tegmark followed by ‘Contagious: Why Things Catch On’ from Jonah Berger in the new year. After that, who knows? But, if you would like to join us then leave a comment below or drop us a line and we’ll send you an invite to our inaugural and VERY informal first book club meeting at 3pm on Friday December 2nd (because I’m on holiday on November 25th - DOH!).

I hope by that date I’ll also be able to officially launch our new video podcast ‘The Business of Storytelling’ sponsored by Vimeo and featuring brand CMOs, agency CEOs and chief editors of popular publications in the first eight episodes of season one. Here’s a sneaky peak just for you 🤫

Right, I’d better get back in the edit suite if I’m going to meet that podcast deadline. Have a creative and productive week.

Neal.