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Dreaming Up and Writing Down
At this very moment, I’m sitting in a Borders bookstore cafe. I tell you this to give you context for the words that will follow. See, when I’m surrounded by books and people looking at books and people talking about looking at books, I find it difficult to stay focused. My thoughts wander, my words follow. Or my words wander and my thoughts follow. Sometimes my thoughts and words both wander and I lose myself in a… I can’t figure out if the tiles on the floor of this cafe are arranged in some kind of purposeful pattern or if the tile-placer just made it up on the fly. A…
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Sticks and Stones and Words
Thick skin. That’s what they say you have to have if you’re going to be a writer. Because someday someone will skewer your novel. Not may skewer it. But will. It’s a given. A law. A little like Murphy’s law. A lot like the law of gravity. Someone is going to hate your book. Really, truly despise it. This will inevitably make you want to do one of the following: a. Dig a hole. Climb into it. Stay there. b. Push the writer of that review out of a helicopter without a parachute because anyone who can’t see the subtle brilliance of your prose needs to learn a lesson about great…