Author: Steve Parolini
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The Benefits of Not Caring
Maybe you shouldn’t invest so much of yourself in your writing. I mean, look at what it’s doing to you. You’re staying up until after one or getting up at four just to write “one more scene.” You were late picking up your kids from school, what, three times last week? You haven’t made a…
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Totally Believable Publishing Predictions for 2011
My predictions are based on extensive eavesdropping at my local Starbucks. Additional data supplied by that one night when I might have accidentally taken too much cough medicine before bed. 1. Barnes & Noble and Borders will merge after all and call their new stores “Noble Borders.” This will result in the closing of nearly…
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10 Reasons Someone Else’s Novel Shouldn’t Have Been Published
Admit it. You’ve stared, slack-jawed at an open book in Barnes & Noble, stunned by the horribleness of the writing. You’ve whispered your frustration to the universe, a few choice obscenities that brought an audible “harrumph” from a blue-haired woman browsing the nearby Christian Inspiration section. How is it possible this hack of a writer…
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Do the Best You Can With What You Have
There’s little need for a post here. If you’re pressed for time, just read the title again, let it inspire some brilliant application for your writing life, then jet off to Nova Scotia to see a total eclipse of the sun. (Yes, I’m talking to you.) Of course, if you want to spend a few more…
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Thangst
It’s hard to look at. The ache. The mistake. The longing. The breakup. The failure. The betrayal. The abandonment. The affair. The loss. The sin. When you sit down at your desk to write, it clears its throat. It’s hiding behind your lamp or tucked under an unpaid utility bill. It’s watching, waiting. It nods…
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The Editor’s Hat – 11 Tips for Your Second Draft
Your first draft is done. Wait, it’s not? Then go away and don’t come back until it is. This is not the post you’re looking for. The rest of you can stay, but only if you promise not to make fun of the people who aren’t finished with their first drafts yet. Because you were…