‘Word Hero’ Jay Heinrich is Here to Bend Your Will to His Liking..And Teach You to do the Same!

Science fiction and fantasy fiction is famously full of amazing technology and magical spells that make the impossible possible. Traveling faster than the speed of light across the cold, starry divide or destroying a kingdom with a gesture are child’s play in the worlds of our favorite authors. We in the “real” world aren’t as lucky…or are we?

I believe that words are a kind of magic – perhaps the most awesome, potent magic there is. Forget the schoolyard rhyme about “sticks and stones” – words can indeed hurt you. They can heal, too. With a few choice phrases empires rise, heroes are made and villains cut down to size. A simple sentence, “I love you”, can bond two people together for eternity. Words are more powerful than death. What wizard or alien being of fiction can lay claim to anything more powerful than words?

Words are powerful, but much like the sorcerer’s apprentice, an initiate in the mysteries of the written word must spend many hours in study in order to use them properly. In the hands of a dedicated wordsmith, a Thesaurus becomes a grimoire, and a dictionary a bestiary of exotic and powerful beasts. He or she listens at the feet of the masters, seeking out their tomes and plumbing their depths for hidden secrets. It is a long journey, the path from a simple slinger of word-cantrips to a grand practitioner of linguistic sorcery, but there are those who can help – sherpas on the mountain of lexicological enlightenment. Listen to their words, writer, and profit.

Enter Jay Heinrich, one such master of the written word. His newest book is Word Hero, a mischievous magical tome written to instruct writers in the craft of creating witty, compelling and contagiously comical text. I asked Heinrich to write a couple of paragraphs about Word Hero for our readers. Here is what he supplied:

While Word Hero isn’t exactly science fiction—it’s a guide to crafting lines that people will remember—my book contains one of the strangest mind-bending techniques ever invented. (I’m not bragging: the technique comes from a pair of tricks that writers, advertisers and political consultants have quietly used for many years.)

Called the “belonging trope,” the technique takes a part of something—or an ingredient, characteristic, or member—and makes it represent the whole deal. It’s not as complicated as it sounds. Learn how to use it, and you have the single most nefarious persuasion technique there is. It’s nefarious because it works, and because people don’t recognize it. (Go to WordHero.org to learn more).

The belonging trope can also help you write science fiction, because—like every trope—it bends reality, letting you see the world, or worlds, differently.

I wrote my book because the tools in it have helped me think better, write better, and speak better. The tools in it bend my mind. They can help you bend others’ as well.

-Jay Heinrich