• Writing for Emotional Impact

  • Advanced Dramatic Techniques to Attract, Engage, and Fascinate the Reader from Beginning to End
  • By: Karl Iglesias
  • Narrated by: Karl Iglesias
  • Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (145 ratings)

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Writing for Emotional Impact  By  cover art

Writing for Emotional Impact

By: Karl Iglesias
Narrated by: Karl Iglesias
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Publisher's summary

There are three kinds of feelings when reading a story: boredom, interest, and wow! To become a successful writer, you must create the wow feeling on as many pages as possible, and this requires writing that engages the reader emotionally.

In his best-selling book, screenwriter Karl Iglesias explored the working habits of A-list Hollywood scribes. Now, he breaks new ground by focusing on the psychology of the reader.

Based on his acclaimed classes at UCLA Extension, Writing for Emotional Impact goes beyond the basics and argues that Hollywood is in the emotion-delivery business, selling emotional experiences packaged in movies and TV shows.

Karl not only encourages you to deliver emotional impact on as many pages as possible, he shows you how, offering you hundreds of dramatic techniques to take your writing to the professional level.

In this audiobook, you will learn:

  • Over 40 techniques to humanize a character for instant empathy
  • The seven essential storytelling emotions
  • Over 70 techniques to create them
  • Over 50 ways to craft powerful scenes, including the emotional palette
  • Over 30 techniques to shape your words and energize your narrative description
  • The most common dialogue flaws and fixes for each
  • Over 60 techniques to craft dynamic dialogue that snaps, crackles, and pops off the page

Not only does Karl Iglesias "get" emotion, but he also shares insider secrets for moving the reader from tears to laughter and everywhere in between.

Praise for the book:

"This is a must-have book for every screenwriter, director, and producer." (Rosa Graham, president of Find the Funny)

"Reading Writing for Emotional Impact will shake up your world. This is the book that tears through the clutter so that you can write from the heart." (Michael Lent, author of Breakfast with Sharks and co-producer of Hard Scrambled)

©2011 Karl Iglesias (P)2020 IFH Books

What listeners say about Writing for Emotional Impact

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Best audiobook by far for writing screenplays

If I were stranded on a desert island with a typewriter and paper, this is the book I'd want to help me in my writing. This book is for screenwriting, but I found most of it applied to write novels as well. Now, this is the live seminar that inspired the book but it is remarkable. It goes deeper than the book does. So good.

Iglesias takes the challenge of making you a better writer head-on. He starts out with that promise and delivers. His intent is to help you write scene by scene, paragraph by paragraph in such a way that no one could set your book down. He shows you how to ensure the reader cares about your characters and feels the character's emotions. He also points out how to make sure the reader has a takeaway that will make them talk about your story to other people.

He shows how to build tension, write snappy dialog, and deliver emotional scenes. He does this by examining movies like case studies and does it in a way that really hooks you. There are other books that examine movie plots and dialog, but this book is an order of magnitude better than the rest.

This is the most influential book on writing I can think of. I re-wrote my manuscript after reading this book. If you get mired down in chapter one, skip it, but this book is a must-read.

For any writer out there, I RECOMMEND THIS AUDIOBOOK ABOVE ALL OTHERS on the subject of writing.

Do I know the Author? No. Did I get the book for free? No. Is this an impartial review? Yes. This book will full on make you a better writer, and I look forward to a world filled with more intriguing, engrossing books!

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13 people found this helpful

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The audiobook is actually a series of (AWESOME) workshops!

Wow. Because this is not a script I will write on the nose: these workshops are f*cking awesome!! What a great value.

This isn’t actually a reading of the book, but several seminars that cover the same concepts. They are memorable and helpful and presented in a way that’s imho easier to digest than if this were a reading of the book. The seminars include: scene writing, dialogue, subtext, pitching, writing vivid descriptions, engaging reader emotions, and others. It’s like full day of 8 or 9 workshops for less than $20!

What was also great was getting actual techniques to use. Going to listen again with a notebook for notes!

I have LOTS of craft books but this is by far one of the best. (I’ve also been to a few seminars, which is why I’m blown away by this being less than 20 bucks! ) Great surprise to be actually getting a seminar rather than the reading.

(I’d buy the actual reading, too, Mr. Iglesias, so may be worth publishing that too!)

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7 people found this helpful

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Excellent material

Excellent material for a screen writer or a novelist. Much of the Audible version is from lectures. At first I had a problem the lack of polish in the speaking (um’s, dead space, etc.) but the content is so useful that I quickly got over it. Highly recommend this one.

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Has he ever met a female screenwriter??

I wanted to love this book, but I think if you’re a woman trying to break in, it may be more discouraging than encouraging. Right off the bat, when he says “all women put on makeup” but not all women can “walk the runways in Milan” - making a point about how everyone can write but not everyone can be a professional screenwriter. (The male example is driving and Formula One - since women don’t drive?) So many cringe moments. The dialogue examples he uses, the writers he references, all hyper male. I found myself so distracted by the casual misogyny. I’d love to send him a Norah Ephron script. His advice is better than the typical formula stuff, but also pretty basic / obvious if you are already a working writer. If not, then this may be helpful. I am bummed and wish I could get my credit back.

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3 people found this helpful

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I am still listening to this powerful book.

I want this book to 've in my heart. I look at the Author as one of my professors. I can't see not listening to this book. This is a book filled with powerful words, concepts and. direction. I look forward to hearing and reading more books by this Author.

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Thank you Karl

As a songwriter I benefited hugely from Karl Inglesias’ lectures. He’s easy to follow along with and gives great analogies and examples

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In depth stuff

This book is actually a great collection of Carl Iglesias’s seminars on these topics but regardless of the format, it’s an incredible collection of knowledge and useful for screenwriters to learn from.

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Excellent resource for budding novelists too!

I am on my second listen of this title as I type and just ordered the paperback. Of all of the books I've listened to, and there are many in my collection, this has the most applicable tips. He doesn't offer recipes, he provides ingredients and places to start. The recordings are from a series of workshops so there is some repetition in the introductions of some of the chapters.

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Listen

It's good and he goes on about the details behind what I took for granted

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Well worth a listen.

Several key points that helped me. Eliciting emotion from the reader is something other writing books don't cover nearly as well as this book.

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