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Tumbling Down a Hill in a House That is On Fire
Duane SwierczynskiThe best bit of that advice, and one I would take to heart as a novelist, is the idea of keeping your readers off kilter whenever possible
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The Truth About Writer’s Block
Dawn RaffelI’ve never been a wake-up-at-five-in-the-morning-and-write-every-day kind of gal. I have nothing but admiration for people with that seat-of-the-pants-to-the-chair...
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For Shame!
Stefan Merrill BlockI didn’t discover serious graphic novels until my early twenties, and—as much as I enjoy them now—the form is freighted for me with envy and regret
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Composing
Terese SvobodaYou’ve got the words. They’re swirling around in your head all day – all night for the more unfortunate among us
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All the Pointers, None of the Intimidation
Patrick RyanWorkshops are like relationships in many respects: they can be healthy or unhealthy, productive or unproductive, a fusing of minds or a battle of egos
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On De-Purpling Your Prose
Courtney ZoffnessIt’s natural to remember your first attempts at fiction with a combination of wistfulness and shame. Sometimes I think about mine, an international...
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The Red Bandana
Ann PackerI’ve recently finished a novel—truly finished, as in it’s departed copyediting and headed for page proofs—and I find myself in a familiar...
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One Thing I Never Learned in Workshop
Victor LavalleA few days later he called me up. He sounded dazed. He’d been writing his script and quickly noticed a pattern. In the first panel his characters...
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The Most Important Words
Dawn RaffelI’ve been an editor for a very long time—let’s say several lifetimes in dog years—and I’ll let you in on a secret
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On the Search for Great Fiction
Stefan Merrill BlockUntil the day I queried my agent, I was a closeted writer. I had this vaguely superstitious and probably self-defeating belief that to admit out...