Recently I started a new (day) job. I was really excited, so in anticipation of the new position, I read The First 90 Days by Michael Watkins. The book basically outlines a set of strategies to ensure the reader is on the track to success from day one.
I read it, and I realized—despite its corporate/management focus, some of these tips are applicable to writing projects as well!
A couple of years ago, I read Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy. You know, the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series. Well, truthfully, I didn’t exactly read the trilogy. I read the first two books and ditched the third after about fifty pages. In this post, let’s talk about what that third book got so wrong.
“Art is not the application of a canon of beauty but what the instinct and the brain can conceive beyond any canon. When we love a woman we don’t start measuring her limbs.”
“The only requirement,” to be a writer, said Stephen King, “is the ability to remember every scar.”
I have a few scars (and you do, too). There’s that girl in the eighth grade, my father’s illness in the seventh, and there was that boy earlier than that who told me to shut up every time I spoke to him.
When did I learn to fear my voice?
We’ve all read work by snarky writers who’ve cast aside the rules and developed their own way. These are the rule-breakers, the free spirits. They don’t take themselves too seriously and even throw in a dash of self-deprecation for effect.
The ones I’m talking about are not bad people, but because of their irreverent behavior they sometimes get lumped in the snob category.
Last week the writing community lost one of its greatest gifts: Maya Angelou.
She was prolific. Lyrical. Compassionate. But above all, she was inspiring.
