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Slate has been running a series on the rituals and techniques of great artists. Today’s article, focuses on ignoring the idea of waiting for inspiration. “Waiting for inspiration to strike is a terrible, terrible plan,” Mason Currey writes. “In fact, perhaps the single best piece of advice I can offer to anyone trying to do [...]

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As many of you know, November is National Novel Writing Month. To help folks blast through their 50,000 words in 30 days, GalleyCat has been providing writing prompts, tips, and words of encouragement. Most notable is this roundup where they collected two years worth of tips into a single post. This week, they referred to [...]

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In the October issue of Outside, Tom Bissell recounts his conversation with Jim Harrison in “The Last Lion.” Bissell is the author of Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter, Chasing the Sea: Lost Among the Ghosts of Empire in Central Asia, and The Father of All Things: A Marine, His Son, and the Legacy of [...]

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Over at The Millions, Josh Rolnick presents a great overview of helpful hints for submitting short stories to journals and magazines. Ten Things I’ve Learned Over 12 Years of Sending Out Stories provides classic, evergreen things that we should all remember. Tip #3 the list is to shoot for the stars at the beginning of [...]

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I don’t enter many writing contests, although lots of people do so with surprising regularity. Some folks approach contests as a way of generating a name and building up a resume. I don’t follow that prescription, but I do like to sometimes use contests as an exercise, to try something a little different, and pursue [...]

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Novelist David Mitchell was featured on the San Francisco Chronicle’s webpage and he pointed out the limitations inherent in one of writing’s most beloved sayings: “‘Write what you know’ will only get you so far,” Mitchell says. “You need to write what you can imagine, write what you can research about, write what you can [...]

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Most longtime readers know of my fascination with the guitar. Many of you also know that I’m working on a book about guitar players. One of the most interesting musicians I’ve encountered in a while is John 5. I’ve spent the morning listening to his new instrumental disc The Art of Malice and I’m amazed [...]

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The Guardian in Great Britain approached a number of writers, such as Elmore Leonard, Annie Proulx, Ian Rankin, and Zadie Smith, to get ten rules of writing fiction from each. They have some interesting advice and certainly there’s something in there each of us can learn from. Check it out here. A couple of writers [...]

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When we observe someone who has truly mastered their craft, whether it’s a writer, athlete, musician, or business person, we tend to assume they achieved that level of mastery through a combination of two ways: 1. They worked really, really hard. 2. They were born with some level of natural talent. However, in Talent is [...]

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Aspiring authors often get enraged at the lack of true, specific information about publishing. We’re constantly told, “There’s no standard timetable for a publisher to respond.” You can substitute timetable for dollar amount or print runs or book tours or literary groupies or type of wine served at booksignings or anything else you can imagine. [...]

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J.A. Konrath, always a source of useful and helpful writing tips, has an interesting post about setting goals for 2009. While most of us focus on landing an agent, getting published, accumulating a certain number of bylines, Konrath points out that you have little control over these accomplishments. Instead, focus on the things that you [...]

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Deciding when to move on from a story (or book or poem or play or whatever) is a challenging choice that bedevils many writers. On the one hand, there are those romantic notions of “never give up on your work!” but on the other hand, there is no doubt that as an author you must [...]

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So as you know, I’m not generally a fan of how-to writing books. I always make sure to mention my favorites (Pat Walsh’s 78 Reasons Why Your Book May Never Be Published… and John Dufresne’s The Lie that Tells a Truth definitely deserve a place of honor on your writing shelf next to John Gardner [...]

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Today, we wrap up our question-of-the-day from Joshua Henkin, author of the critically acclaimed novel Matrimony. Thanks for Joshua for all this time and great information this week. Slushpile: What is your single-best, most-important, can’t-live-without writing tip you would offer to aspiring authors? Henkin: First of all, I want to thank you, Scott, for having [...]

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