I'm a fan of Julia Cameron and her book The Artist's Way.  I had the opportunity to work through the twelve weeks of her program with an online email group.  It was a very healing and expansive process.  Her idea of "morning pages" -- journaling three pages of all the random thoughts and emotions before starting into the work day has been very helpful to me and I still try to incorporate that into daily practice.  The exercises in the book can be coordinated with a support group or on your own.  The real trick to obtaining benefits, as with all workshops-in-a-book, is not just to read the book but actually do the exercises.

Wild Mind: Living the Writers Life by Natalie Goldberg combines memoir, spiritual insights from her years as a student of zen, and writing practice.  The writing exercises are the kind where she gives you a topic and you just start free flow writing from there for ten or fifteen minutes.
 
 

Revision : A Creative Approach to Writing and Rewriting Fiction by David Michael Kaplan.

Recently, I had the opportunity to take a workshop with David Michael Kaplan at the OCWW.    I liked the following piece of advice which I knew but was worth hearing again (and again).  He said, while natural talent is a very nice thing, he felt that talent could be developed by the following:

1.  Read a lot (and read the best stuff because you can't write beyond what you
read).
2.  Write a lot (in a disciplined way and write and keep writing).
3.  Get good feedback (and listen to it).  Get feedback both from your fellow
writers and master writers.

He said, "Be prepared to put in the time.  There is no quick way."

I'll be adding more books to this list in the future.

WRITERS DREAMING By Naomi Epel

Dreams are a window into our creative and chaotic inner consciousness.  Naomi Epel interviewed twenty-six writers from Maya Angelou to William Styron about their dreams at night and the creative process.  Sue Grafton dreams of dangers she can apply to her mystery solving character Kinsey Milhone.  Spaulding Gray uses an insightful dream to conclude his monologue "Swimming to Cambodia."  Steven King had a nightmare and dropped it whole into his horror book "It."

"I think every creative impulse that a working writer, or artist of any sort has, comes out of that dark old country where dreams come from.  I don't know how it would be possible to use that side of yourself, to write or create, without recognizing your dreams or drawing from them," said Anne Rivers Siddon in the book.

 An added benefit of Writers Dreaming is, as they talk about dreams, the interview segues into each author's writing process, how they work, and what inspires their successful ideas.