Reading Like a Writer by Francine Prose

A lot of how-to's seem to blend together or offer variations on the same advice, but the thing Prose does very well here, that few others do, is focus on language and how word choice, sentence structure, and paragraph breaks shape every aspect of the fiction. If you can apply these lessons to story content with depth and weight, well then you'll be in good shape as a writer. Plus it's fun to look at her choices of texts to quote and recognize your old favorites and discover new possibilities.