#i MIGHT just finish chapter one ive had writer's block for so so long man i wanna use this while I have it

[clegfly]

i don't know WHAT the fuck just happened but all I know is that I just woke up with a half-written half decent rendition of that fucking pmmm omori crossover au in my drafts that I wrote half asleep at like one in the morning before passing out

[crowkingwrites]

Battle of the Bands (Ch.12)

Pairing: Robb Stark x Reader, Jon Snow x Reader, Viserys Targaryen x Reader, Ramsay Bolton X Reader

Summary: You just moved into the city for the first tie all by yourself. After you get your dream summer job working for a small magazine, you find yourself in the middle of the city’s rock festival: Battle of the Bands. Local rock bands throughout the city compete to win a record deal that could change their lives. Your job? Get close to them and write about them online.A single girl in the city surrounded by rocker boys during the summertime. What could possibly go wrong?

Words: 2053 // AO3 Link

Chapter One // Chapter Two // Chapter Three // Chapter Four // Chapter Five // Chapter Six // Chapter Seven // Chapter Eight // Chapter Nine // Chapter Ten // Chapter Eleven

You know those days where you’re running around endlessly and it seems like you couldn’t catch your breath? Like one of those days where everything just went to shit? This wasn’t one of them. Instead, you sat back in Jon’s apartment watching a movie character suffer through the worst day of her life over and over again.

“You know, this wouldn’t be happening if she had at least gone on a date with that guy,” Jon said, passing the blunt to you.

You placed the blunt between your lips, but didn’t smoke it. You reached for the remote to pause the movie. “What the fuck do you mean?”

“I mean, she should give him a chance.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s at fault for all of this? If she went on a date with him, she wouldn’t be living her worst day over and over. She should’ve just given him a chance.”

“So, I should go out with Ramsay Bolton on a date or else he’ll kill me?” you said flatly. Jon nodded.

“You’re right. You’re right,” he unpaused the movie and then paused it again. “Ramsay Bolton asked you out?” Oh no. Today was going really, really well. Jon moved closer to you. His hand landed on your ankle.

“Did he bother you? I’ve punched his face in the past, but—

“No, please. I’m just…weird today I guess.” You moved his hand away, and then Jon sat closer to you. His fingers brushed your arm.

“You are being weird. Where are you right now?”

“What do you mean?” you asked, facing him. Jon’s big brown eyes always did you in. You didn’t want to tell him, but if you didn’t you felt like you were lying to him.

“I know Robb really likes you and all, but—

“Ramsay does too,” you came out with it. “We hooked up not too long ago, but that was before you! It was just a one-time deal and I’m not even sure if it’s gonna happen again.” Jon looked down to the floor, digesting everything you told him.

“Do you still like him?” he asked.

“It’s complicated,” you said honestly.

Jon nodded and held his arms out for you. You laid into his chest, feeling his deep breathing soothe you. His arms held you against him on the couch while Jon played the movie again. The main character in the movie gave the guy the middle finger while you silently cheered on.

“I’m not mad, you know,” Jon said aloud. “I’m a little jealous if anything, but I’m not mad. He was your past. I mean, Robb saw you two together. He told me you were with him in a sense, but he’s not your ex-boyfriend. You never dated him. You’re with me now.”

“Wait,” you sat up. “Like I’m with you? As in girlfriend?”

“Yeah,” Jon smiled. “You slept over last night. You know how I feel about you. Right? Doesn’t all of that make you my girlfriend?”

“Jon, I never said I was—

“You never said?” Jon’s eyebrows knitted together. “I thought you had feelings for me.”

“I do! It’s just—

“You have feelings for other guys too, right?” Jon finished the harsh sentence for you. Stark men. Quick to anger always. He rolled his eyes and walked into the kitchen. You followed the potential werewolf explosion.

“Jon, please don’t be mad.”

“Mad? I’m not mad,” Jon grabbed a knife and started to cut open an orange. Each cut was louder than the last.

“You are mad. Please. I don’t want this to be like your brother—

“Then go out with him then. Everyone does. Or better yet, why not piss us both off and go fuck off with Ramsay somewhere. Clearly, you have great taste in men.”

“Now, you’re being mean.”

“I’m being mean?” Jon slammed down the knife and faced you. “I defended you in front of Robb. I told you exactly how I felt about you, and you don’t even want to be with me.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“Do you want to be my girlfriend?”

“Jon—

“Answer the question. Do you want to be my girlfriend or not? Because I don’t know what we’re doing here then.” Jon’s brown eyes turned cold with every second he stared you down. The Stark boys weren’t like Viserys or Ramsay. They were a different kind of dangerous. One that should be taken seriously, not played around with. You held up your hands in a surrender. You exhaled all of the air from your lungs, maybe if you worded things carefully, Jon would understand.

“After what happened with Robb, I’m not sure it’s a good idea to jump into a relationship with you this soon. I’m not even sure if I want a boyfriend anymore. I don’t want to hurt Robb. I don’t want to hurt you. It’s not the answer you want, but it’s the truth.”

Jon closed in the space between you. “You’re right. I can’t be mad at you for telling me the truth. If you want to wait, I can wait. I’ll wait as long as you tell me to. Just as long as I still get to kiss you.”

Jon’s lips brushed yours again. He tasted like the oranges he just cut. His hands wrapped behind your head as he leaned into you. Your hands found his chest and they rested there. You could hear a bird singing outside and you swore your heart knew the same song. His lips were soft and hungry. You opened your mouth for more access, and he took advantage.

His hands slid down to your hips and picked you up to place to on the kitchen counter. You found yourself in a happy embrace until

“Y/N? Jon?” Robb said from the doorway.

“Fuck! Robb!” Jon pulled away immediately. You jumped down from the kitchen counter and faced Robb. He stood there frozen to his spot. You couldn’t tell if you shocked him or broke him entirely.

“I have to go. I have to go,” you pushed past Robb and left Jon’s apartment. You put your face in your hands and groaned loud. Okay, maybe you were having a bad day. One person could sort this out.

You to Margie: [Guess who landed herself a restraining order from the Starks? Hint! Its me.] Margie: [What happened? Also! I think I met someone today ;) ] You: [Whaaaaaaaaaaat? Who?] Margie: [His name is Podrick. His dick is…oh my god. I think it’s the best dick ive ever seen.] You: [Girl you did NOT] Margie: [No! Not yet anywaysss…I did get some good pictures from him. But tell me what happened!!! You’re with jon and??] You: [Robb discovered us. We were kissing and he just walked right in.] Margie: [Oh. Fuck. Did Robb know that you two were?] You: [Nope.] Margie: [And??] You: [And I walked out. What else was I supposed to do?] Margie: [Hmph. You right. Issa mood.]

You rolled your eyes at your best friend’s slang. What else were you supposed to do? Stay and explain why you were kissing your boss’ brother at his place? After Robb just gave you front page? Didn’t fucking think so. Your phone buzzed again.

Ramsay: [What the actual fuck is this?]

[Sent Image]

You saw a picture of the headline from The Scene. ‘Viz Targaryen: A Real Dragon or a Low Snake?’ You smiled and watched the typing balloon pop up on your screen. Come to think of it, the famous Viz himself hadn’t texted or called you yet. You wondered if he knew.

Ramsay: [Are you coming after me too? What the fuck is this?] You: [Aw, is somebody scared of the writer now?] Ramsay: [If you’re gonna pull that me too bullshit with me, I will remind you that we had very consensual sex and I did some happy biting on you, bitch.] You: [You call me a bitch like that’s supposed to offend me.] Ramsay: [I could call you a whore, but you seem very comfortable fucking me and then lying about it.]

That one cut deep. You closed your eyes before you responded to the asshole that made you skin crawl and head confused.

You: [What do you want?] Ramsay: [Are you writing articles like this about me? Did you fuck my band over?] You: [No. Why would I fucking do that?] Ramsay: [My father is in his office with Viz right now. Viz is fucking pissed off at you. He’s going to try take you to court.] You: [Whoa. What? How do you know that?]

You saw the typing bubble come up again. You had time to get to The Scene’s office and warn—shit. Robb was at Jon’s place. Renly. Renly would be at the ‘The Scene’ office. Your feet carried you four blocks in on direction and two blocks in another direction. Your phone buzzed again with a block of text from Ramsay.

Ramsay: [I told you. I cut a deal with my dad. Battle of the Bands was my last chance to get anywhere in the music scene. I had to quit and clean up my act. I work here with my dad now. Viz and his band came in here 15 minutes ago. They want you to stop writing. You have so much dirt on everyone in the battle. That’s how I know.] You: [You…youre a lawyer? You have a law degree?] Ramsay: [I told you that I was awful. I never said I was stupid like Viz was.] You: [So you agree? Viz is stupid.] Ramsay: [He’s stupid enough to piss you off. Three brands dropped his band today. Because of that article, he could lose both the battle of the bands and whatever record labels that were looking at him.]

You smiled. Fucking over toxic men was your calling. You knew it. Ramsay sent another block of text over to you.

Ramsay: [Look, I don’t know who fucked over my band. It could be Renly. But it could be you.] You: [I had nothing to do with your band being disqualified. You belong up there on a stage. I saw what you did to your crowds. You’re really talented.] Ramsay: [How do I know youre not lying to me?]

When you reached The Scene’s office, you found Bran manning the record store again. He quietly played with his old Gameboy.

“Hi Bran,” you said to him.

“Don’t eat Chinese tonight. You might regret it.”

“Oh..okay Bran. Nice seeing you?” You made your way up to the office. You heard Bran once more going up.

“Even dragons have their endings, Y/N.”

You spoke about Bran a couple of times with Robb. You weren’t sure what was up with him and his…way of speaking with people? Robb usually shrugged it off and told you that’s just how Bran was after an accident where he fell out of a tree. When you asked Jon about it, he simply told you “if you’re asking me if I believe in God, then yes I do, because I don’t know what Bran is but something made him that way.”

You turned back to your phone. How would you prove to Ramsay you were on his side? When you looked around, you found the office mostly empty save for everyone’s pet goldfish, Jules, who swam to and fro in his bowl on Renly’s desk. You made your way to your desk and found the perfect proof.

You took a picture of your playlist on your computer at work. It was a mix between Ramsay’s favorite music and Bloddy Bastard’s first album.

You: [There. If that’s not proof I didn’t do shit, I don’t know what is.] Ramsay: [You really liked our first kiss, didn’t you? ;) I see American trash playing in the corner. Alright. I believe you. I’ll text you later. I’m going in. I’ll tell you what happens afterwards. You might want to warn Robb what’s about to happen. Viz is out for blood. He might want to tear down the entire magazine.]

You sighed in relief knowing you had a bad boy lawyer on your side, but it didn’t last long. Robb had to find out about this soon. And you just got caught kissing his brother, Jon, who you couldn’t decide on dating or not.

Note to Self: Your father taught you how to get yourself out a pickle…this is a VERY DIFFERENT PICKLE.

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[transguykeith]

i wanted to ask u a few of the writer asks but i can't decide which one i want to ask you most, could you answer all the asks? lmao if its too muh of a mission i can just decide on a few

It’s not like I’m doing anything else so yeah, why not. I just won’t ones that might not apply. I’ll put some of this under a read more:

1. Describe your comfort zone—a typical you-fic.

usually some sort of character study of sorts mixed in with scattered events to lead to an ultimate end goal.

2. Is there a trope you’ve yet to try your hand at, but really want to?

im a sucker for a good soulmate au, so maybe one of those eventually

3. Is there a trope you wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole?

i would never write an abo fic, just no

4. How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now? Care to share one of them?

um, a LOT, like a ton of them my main one is a college au of sorts centering around Yuuri and Phichit as well as Victor, its title is Made of Stars and its gonna be fun to write

5. Share one of your strengths.

i mean, i guess im okay at character studies, but i dunno, im really not super great

6. Share one of your weaknesses.

pretty much everything, im not great at connectivity or writing in a pretty style. like i just kinda write, im not particularly great at it

7. Share a snippet from one of your favorite pieces of prose you’ve written and  explain why you’re proud of it.

This is from chapter 5 of You’re Not Alone:He danced because he skated, and he skated because skating was flying. And somewhere along the way he forgot what had drawn him to it the first place. He supposed that that was what he was searching for some days, that spark that started everything.

That spark that started a fire, a fire that’s flames were the smallest they had ever been. It was almost funny how one small moment could all but extinguish him. A spark started it all, ballet was just kindling, ice skating was logs, and he was a forest ablaze. But it was as if that one moment had sucked the oxygen from the air and the flames died, it suffocated him.

This is a bit flowwier than some of what i write, it’s one of my favorite lines because it encompasses what i have him feeling in that exact moment

8. Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

I think this is one of my favorites, it’s from chapter 17 of You’re Not Alone:

“I’m glad too,” Otabek smiled. “It’s how this doing goes though. You dedicate your soul, mind, and body to the ice and you don’t always get to leave without losing something to it. It’s give and take, we’re all just caught in an intricate dance until the fates bottom us out one way or another.”

“When did you go all serious on me?” Yuri teased. He had gotten used to Otabek’s propensity for the occasional dramatic monologue though, they gave a good look into the head of his friend.

“Think about it Yuri,” Otabek clearly wasn’t done. “Here we are, the pinnacle of humanity, literally trying to carve a place for ourselves in history. We have to fight the fundamentals of the universe to do what we do, work against gravity itself all while having a timer above our heads. Who knows when it will expire and the ice will take it all away. We fight everything to be able to do this: the laws of physics, the passing of time, even our own bodies. That’s what makes you a soldier, we all fight this fight but you’re out there with a makeshift helmet and a sharpened stick while the rest of us have full armor and swords. And who is it that we see winning the battle time and time again, you.”

“Did you really drag me out here to give a dramatic monologue on how impressive I am,” Yuri flushed at the barrage of compliments. “You’re such a dork,” he buried his face in his hands.

I just really like how it turned out.

9. Which fic has been the hardest to write?

I guess You’re Not Alone just because of how long it is, but it depends. some of it has been very easy to write and some of it ( ahem my current chapter) has been really hard

10. Which fic has been the easiest to write? 

I’ve written a lot of little drabbles and one shots that i havent posted anywhere but the easiest was probably the little request i did yesterday which is either titled “Pretty Darn Cute” or “The second prettiest boy in the world”

11. Is writing your passion or just a fun hobby?

a little bit of both really

13. What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across?

if you have an idea, write it down immediately. it doesnt matter if youre currently engaged in something else, write that shit down or you WILL lose it

14. What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever come across?

not necessarily advice, but like the idea of only writing it if you think its good

16. If you only could write one pairing for the rest of your life, which pairing would it be?

can I say Yuri Plisetsky and happiness, because yes

17. Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order?

I tend to write my chapters in order, but within each chapter i jump around a bit and then connect everything

18. Do you use any tools, like worksheets or outlines?

I have an outline in my head that i sometimes write down, im usually good about following it

19. Stephen King once said that his muse is a man who lives in the basement. Do you have a muse?

my muse is the genderless ghost that haunts me it stares into my cold soul and pokes me until i words

20. Describe your perfect writing conditions.

I prefer it to be kind of dark and i like to be nice and cozy, though sometimes ill be struck with random inspiration and have to write it no matter where i am

21. How many times do you usually revise your fic/chapter before posting?

Ha, revising?! whats that

25. What do you look for in a beta?I have never had a beta, but if i did have one i would like someone to help me idea bounce and keep my writing from sounding choppy

26. Do you beta yourself? If so, what kind of beta are you? 

I haven’t but i would be willing to if anybody wanted me to. I’m pretty good with general editing skills and idea flow

30. Do you accept prompts?

yes! please send me prompts i love them. I cannot exaggerate how much i appreciate being sent prompts

31. Do you take liberties with canon or are you very strict about your fic being canon compliant?

i would say im right in the middle about this, it really depends on what im writing though

32. How do you feel about smut?

ive never really tried my hand at it, i havent written anything that calls for it, but my next fic might

33. How do you feel about crack?

i kind of have written some stuff that could be considered borderline crack, but most of it isnt fanfic and i havent shared that

34. What are your thoughts on non-con and dub-con?

personally, i probably wouldn’t write it, but if its necessary for a backstory then maybe but certainly not in detail

35. Would you ever kill off a canon character?

oh certainly, just depends on the fic im writing

36. Which is your favorite site to post fic?

ao3

37. Talk about your current wips.

my main wip is Youre Not Alone and that one is getting close to its end, i know where it’s going and how it will end i just have to write my way there, but I’ve had some pretty bad writers block in regards to it lately

38. Talk about a review that made your day.

i got this one really long review gushing about how much my story meant to them and how reading it always made their day feel better and that was just such a nice review and it made me really happy. Another one i really liked was somebody complimenting something i did that a lot of other people complained about so i really appreciated that one

39. Do you ever get rude reviews and how do you deal with them?

ive gotten a few upset reviews about something i included in You’re Not Alone, but i cant do much about it. i once got a review about four chapters in asking why yuri had a menstrual cycle and this wasnt rude exactly, but how do you read that far without knowing he’s trans in my fic

[writingguide003-blog]

44 Writing Hacks From Some of the Greatest Writers Who Ever Lived

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44 Writing Hacks From Some of the Greatest Writers Who Ever Lived

Writing looks fun, but doing it professionally is hard. Like really hard. Why on earth am I doing this?-hard.

Which is probably why so many people want to write, yet so few actually do. But there are ways to make it easier, as many writers can tell you. Tricks that have been discovered over the centuries to help with this difficult craft.

In another industry, these tricks would be considered trade secrets. But writers are generous and they love to share (often in books about writing). They explain their own strategies for how to deal with writers block to how to make sure your computer never eats your manuscript. They give away this hard-won knowledge so that other aspiring writers wont have to struggle in the same way. Over my career, Ive tried to collect these little bits of wisdom in my commonplace book (also a writers trick which I picked up from Montaigne) and am grateful for the guidance theyve provided.

Below, Ive shared a collection of writing hacks from some amazing writers like Kurt Vonnegut, George Orwell, Stephen King, Elizabeth Gilbert, Anne Lamott, and Raymond Chandler. I hope its not too presumptuous but I snuck in a few of my own too (not that I think Im anywhere near as good as them).

Anyway, heres to making this tough job a tiny bit easier!

[*] When you have an idea for an article or a bookwrite it down. Dont let it float around in your head. Thats a recipe for losing it. As Beethoven is reported to have said, If I don’t write it down immediately I forget it right away. If I put it into a sketchbook I never forget it, and I never have to look it up again.

[*] The important thing is to start. At the end of John Fantes book Dreams from Bunker Hill, the character, a writer, reminds himself that if he can write one great line, he can write two and if he can write two he can write three, and if he can write three, he can write forever. He pauses. Even that seemed insurmountable. So he types out four lines from one of his favorite poems. What the hell, he says, a man has to start someplace.

[*] In fact, a lot of writers use that last technique. In Tobias Wolffs autobiographical novel Old School, the character types the passages from his favorite books just to know what it feels like to have those words flow through his fingertips. Hunter S. Thompson often did the same thing. This is another reason why technologies like ebooks and Evernote are inferior to physical interaction. Just highlighting something and saving it to a computer? Theres no tactile memory there.

[*] The greatest part of a writers time is spent in reading; a man will turn over half a library to make one book. Samuel Johnson

[*] Tim Ferriss has said that the goal for a productive writing life is two crappy pages a day. Just enough to make progress, not too ambitious to be intimidating.

[*] They say breakfast (protein) in the morning helps brain function. But in my experience, thats a trade-off with waking up and getting started right away. Apparently Kurt Vonnegut only ate after he worked for 2 hours. Maybe he felt like after that hed earned food.

[*] Michael Malice has advised dont edit while you write. I think this is good advice.

[*] In addition to making a distinction between editing and writing, Robert Greene advises to make an equally important distinction between research and writing. Trying to find where youre going while youre doing it is begging to get horribly lost. Writing is easier when the research is done and the framework has been laid out.

[*] Nassim Taleb wrote in Antifragile that every sentence in the book was a derivation, an application or an interpretation of the short maxim he opened with. THAT is why you want to get your thesis down and perfect. It makes the whole book/essay easier.

[*] Break big projects down into small, discrete chunks. As I am writing a book, I create a separate document for each chapter, as I am writing them. Its only later when I have gotten to the end that these chapters are combined into a single file. Why? The same reason it feels easier to swim seven sets of ten laps, than to swim a mile. Breaking it up into pieces makes it seem more achievable. The other benefit in writing? It creates a sense that each piece must stand on its own.

[*] Embrace what the strategist and theorist John Boyd called the draw-down period. Take a break right before you start. To think, to reflect, to doubt.

[*] On being a writer: All the days of his life he should be reading as faithfully as his partaking of food; reading, watching, listening. John Fante

[*] Dont get caught up with pesky details. When I am writing a draft, I try not to be concerned with exact dates, facts or figures. If I remember that a study conducted by INSERT UNIVERSITY found that XX% of businesses fail in the first FIVE/SIX? months, thats what I write (exactly like that). If I am writing that on June XX, 19XX Ronald Reagan gave his famous Tear Down This Wall speech in Berlin in front of XX,XXX people, thats how its going to look. Momentum is the most important thing in writing, so Ill fill the details in later. I just need to get the sentences down first. “Get through a draft as quickly as possible.” is how Joshua Wolf Shenk put it.

[*] Raymond Chandler had a trick of using small pieces of paper so he would never be afraid to start over. Also with only 12-15 lines per page, it forced economy of thought and actionwhich is why his stuff is so readable.

[*] In The Artists Way, Julia Cameron reminds us that our morning pages and our journaling dont count as writing. Just as walking doesnt count as exercise, this is just priming the pumpits a meditative experience. Make sure you treat it as such.

[*] Steven Pressfield said that he used to save each one of his manuscripts on a disk that hed keep in the glovebox of his car. Robert Greene told me he sometimes puts a copy of his manuscript in the trunk of his car just in case. I bought a fireproof gun safe and keep my stuff in therejust in case.

[*] My editor Niki Papadopoulos at Penguin: Its not what a book is. Its what a book does.

[*] While you are writing, read things totally unrelated to what youre writing. Youll be amazed at the totally unexpected connections youll make or strange things youll discover. As Shelby Foote put it in an interview with The Paris Review: I cant begin to tell you the things I discovered while I was looking for something else.

[*] Writing requires what Cal Newport calls deep workperiods of long, uninterrupted focus and creativity. If you dont give yourself enough of this time, your work suffers. He recommends recording your deep work time each dayso you actually know if youre budgeting properly.

[*] Software does not make you a better writer. Fuck Evernote. Fuck Scrivner. You dont need to get fancy. If classics were created with quill and ink, youll probably be fine with a Word Document. Or a blank piece of paper. Dont let technology distract you. As Joyce Carol Oates put it in an interview, Every writer has written by hand until relatively recent times. Writing is a consequence of thinking, planning, dreaming this is the process that results in writing, rather than the way in which the writing is recorded.

[*] Talk about the ideas in the work everywhere. Talk about the work itself nowhere. Dont be the person who tweets Im working on my novel. Be too busy writing for that. Helen Simpson has Faire et se taire from Flaubert on a Post-it near her desk, which she translates as Shut up and get on with it.

[*] Why cant you talk about the work? Its not because someone might steal it. Its because the validation you get on social media has a perverse effect. Youll less likely to put in the hard work to complete something that youve already been patted (or patted yourself) on the back for.

[*] When you find yourself stuck with writers block, pick up the phone and call someone smart and talk to them about whatever the specific area youre stuck with is. Not that youre stuck, but about the topic. By the time you put your phone down, youll have plenty to write. (As Seth Godin put it, nobody gets talkers block.)

[*] Keep a commonplace book with anecdotes, stories and quotes you can always usefrom inspiration to directly using in your writing. And these can be anything. H.L. Mencken for example, would methodically fill a notebook with incidents, recording scraps of dialogue and slang, columns from the New York Sun.

[*] As you write down quotes and observations in your commonplace book, make sure to do it by hand. As Raymond Chandler wrote, when you have to use your energy to put words down, you are more apt to make them count.

[*] Elizabeth Gilbert has a good trick for cutting: As you go along, Ask yourself if this sentence, paragraph, or chapter truly furthers the narrative. If not, chuck it. And as Stephen King famously put it, kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribblers heart, kill your darlings.

[*] Strenuous exercise everyday. For me, and for a lot of other writers, its running. Novelist Don DeLillo told The Paris Review how after writing for four hours, he goes running to shake off one world and enter another. Joyce Carol Oates, in her ode to running, said that the twin activities of running and writing keep the writer reasonably sane and with the hope, however illusory and temporary, of control.

[*] Ask yourself these four questions from George Orwell: What am I trying to say? What words will express it? What image or idiom will make it clearer? Is this image fresh enough to have an effect? Then finish with these final two questions: Could I put it more shortly? Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly?

[*] As a writer you need to make use of everything that happens around you and use it as material. Make use of Seinfelds question: Im never not working on material. Every second of my existence, I am thinking, Can I do something with that?

[*] Airplanes with no wifi are a great place to write and even better for editing. Because there is nowhere to go and nothing else to do.

[*] Print and put a couple of important quotes up on the wall to help guide you (either generally, or for a specific project). Heres a quote from a scholar describing why Ciceros speeches were so effective which I put on my wall while I was writing my first book. At his best [Cicero] offered a sustained interest, a constant variety, a consummate blend of humour and pathos, of narrative and argument, of description and declamation; while every part is subordinated to the purpose of the whole, and combines, despite its intricacy of detail, to form a dramatic and coherent unit. (emphasis mine)

[*] Focus on what youre saying, worry less about how. As William March wrote in The Bad Seed, A great novelist with something to say has no concern with style or oddity of presentation.

[*] A little trick I came up with. After every day of work, I save my manuscript as a new file (for example: EgoIsTheEnemy2-26.docx) which is saved on my computer and in Dropbox (before Dropbox, I just emailed it to myself). This way I keep a running record of the evolution of book. It comforts me that I can always go back if I mess something up or if I have to turn back around.

[*] Famous ad-man David Ogilvy put it bluntly: Use short words, short sentences and short paragraphs.

[*] Envision who you are writing this for. Like really picture them. Dont go off in a cave and do this solely for yourself. As Kurt Vonnegut put it in his interview with The Paris Review: …every successful creative person creates with an audience of one in mind. Thats the secret of artistic unity. Anybody can achieve it, if he or she will make something with only one person in mind.

[*] Do not chase exotic locations to do some writing. Budd Schulbergs novel The Disenchanted about his time with F. Scott Fitzgerald expresses the dangers well: It was a time everyone was pressing wonderful houses on us. I have a perfectly marvelous house for you to write in, theyd say. Of course no one needs marvelous houses to write in. I still knew that much. All you needed was one room. But somehow the next house always beckoned.”

[*] True enough, though John Fante said that when you get stuck writing, hit the road.

[*] Commitments (at the micro-level) are important too. An article a week? An article a month? A book a year? A script every six weeks? Pick something, but commit to itpublicly or contractually. Quantity produces quality, as Ray Bradbury put it.

[*] Dont ever write anything you dont like yourself and if you do like it, dont take anyones advice about changing it. They just dont know. Raymond Chandler

[*] Neil Strauss and Tucker Max gave me another helpful iteration of that idea (which I later learned is from Neil Gaiman): When someone tells you something is wrong with your writing, theyre usually right. When they tell you how to fix it, theyre almost always wrong.

[*] Ogilvy had another good rule: Never use jargon words like reconceptualize, demassification, attitudinally, judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass.

[*] Print out the work and edit it by hand as often as possible. It gives you the readers point of view.

[*] Hemingway advised fellow writer Thomas Wolfe to break off work when you ‘are going good.’Then you can rest easily and on the next day easily resume. Brian Koppelman (Rounders, Billions) has referred to this as stopping on wet edge. It staves off the despair the next day.

[*] Keep the momentum: Never stop when you are stuck. You may not be able to solve the problem, but turn aside and write something else. Do not stop altogether. Jeanette Winterson

That taps me out for now. But every time I read I compile a few more notecards. Ill update you when Ive got another round to share.

In the meantime, stop reading stuff on the internet and get back to writing!

But if you have a second…share your own tips below.

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