Voices. Voices everywhere. What I consider to be the hardest part of starting a novel is not technical, exactly. It’s not the outlining or the descriptive note cards I might have scattered about the bedroom like so much detritus nor the initial formatting of the manuscript (which I’ve since learned is just foolish at the…
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In 2002 (or so), a writer friend (the-great-and-not-quite-as-unknown-as-me Eric A. Jackson) and I were discussing what makes good fiction. At the time, he had recently loaned me a copy of Bentley Little’s The Collection, a great book of short stories. One of those stories included a dead llama. Naturally, the discussion on what made good…
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As I do the research necessary to write another novel, I find myself running into things I didn’t think existed. Some writers might need a little inspiration, and the archive of legislation through the years is certainly broad enough to provide that inspiration to many people. But that’s not what this is about.
You really can inhale a novel idea, especially if the novel involves dust and you stand in the middle of a dust storm. It’s quite the experience.
I originally wrote part of this post just before I turned 40. However, I sometimes need to be reminded why I’m here. It happens every once in a while: you bury yourself in the business aspect of writing, looking at numbers, trying to forecast the way the readership blows, but when all is said and…
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Transit Novels
Nonfiction
The Rest
