Hunter presents a how-to approach to fostering and encouraging creativity.

The author, a playwright, columnist, and longtime teacher of creative writing at the college level, presents in these pages a sweeping look at the history and nature of creativity itself, both as a neurological phenomenon and as a response to living in a complex world. Drawing on his extensive experience working with students of all kinds, Hunter outlines several approaches to conceiving and working with different kinds of imagination, backed throughout by the author’s efficient presentation of modern neurological science. “Paying conscious attention is how we think, how we learn, and how we observe,” he writes. “It is how the brain shapes the synaptic connection.” Whether discussing the mechanisms of paying attention, the vagaries of remembering things, or the effectiveness of brainstorming, Hunter uses a combination of anecdotes, quotations, and carefully chosen illustrations to reinforce his point that the human brain is in a constant state of imaginative activity. “We live in a river of experiences, sensations, thoughts, sounds, memories, and vision that roll through the brain from moment to moment,” he writes. These insights are fleshed out with examples taken from the lives and writings of some of history’s celebrated creative people, familiar figures like Einstein and da Vinci. The author also includes people from his own life, as when he recalls that his brother used to say any meeting that lasts longer than 30 minutes either has the wrong people or the wrong information.

The book is an inviting exercise in demystifying the most enigmatic elements of the creative process, and its greatest strengths are Hunter’s vivid prose and straightforward explanations. He calls procrastination “a form of metacognition that usually works to our detriment,” for instance, and advocates regular mental cleanses to aid creativity. “We all generate garbage – literal and figurative,” he writes. “Take your garbage out – write or paint it out of your mind.” He frequently mentions something called H-IQ, a teaching tool of his own invention that may help students to better understand and practice creativity, but the main elements of his text stand independent of any outside programs. The author’s insistence that creativity is a mental muscle that can be developed through steady work is energizing: “Imagination is a daily tool,” he insists. “We use imagination constantly, not just in playful moments of daydreams or wistful thinking.” The book brings a wealth of fresh and thought-provoking perspectives to the workings of the human mind, with reassuring reminders that those workings aren’t always clear. (“Sometimes, we are the last to know what our brains are thinking.”) A key aspect of Hunter’s project—firmly putting his readers in the driver’s seats of their own perceptions—becomes especially pointed in his discussion of robotics and AI (as when he argues that before we can “humanize” AI, we must further humanize ourselves by practicing tolerance, kindness, and compassion), but it’s present throughout the book.

A lively and upbeat overview of what creativity is and how it can be strengthened.