Writing Personal Essays: How to Shape Your Life Experiences for the Page

I have always wanted to learn how to write essays and this book is very good as a foundation type of book for essay writing. I recommend it highly.

The author walks the reader through 8 basic types of essays, and provides writing exercises for each of those types. Where this book is most helpful, however, is in the critiquing of the essays written by one of the author's students. Ms. Bender shows you her process of critique in the samples of the student's first draft and second draft.First, she singles out those "velcro words" (the nouns and phrases in the first draft essay that stick with her) -- and she encourages you to take your own note of your "velcro words". She then walks through her feelings as she reads the essay -- where she is intrigued, for example, or confused by the images the student uses. Finally, she shares this information with the student so that the student can choose to elaborate or minimize certain parts of the essay in a second draft, thus producing tighter writing and more polished images.I find Bender's process of critique quite useful and relatively painless.