On Writing Well

Faithful readers,

New Content Monday is upon us once again! In order to ensure that you are celebrating this weekly holiday with gusto, we have opted to share several pieces of advice from our favorite authors about the craft of writing. Enjoy these words of gold.

Also, Zach and I are hard at work preparing our collection of short stories, which is due to be released this fall! If you've ever had reason to be excited about anything in your life, this is it.

"Read, read, read. Read everything--trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You'll absorb it. Then write. If it is good, you'll find out. If it's not, throw it out the window."
-William Faulkner

“Writing isn't about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end, it's about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own life, as well. It's about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy.”
-Stephen King

“If you want to write, if you want to create, you must be the most sublime fool that God ever turned out and sent rambling. You must write every single day of your life. You must read dreadful dumb books and glorious books, and let them wrestle in beautiful fights inside your head, vulgar one moment, brilliant the next. You must lurk in libraries and climb the stacks like ladders to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy heads. I wish you a wrestling match with your Creative Muse that will last a lifetime. I wish craziness and foolishness and madness upon you. May you live with hysteria, and out of it make fine stories — science fiction or otherwise. Which finally means, may you be in love every day for the next 20,000 days. And out of that love, remake a world.”
-Ray Bradbury

"There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed."
-Ernest Hemingway

"Substitute 'damn' every time you're inclined to write 'very'; your editor will delete it and your writing will be just as it should be."
-Mark Twain

As always, bring us your questions, comments, and opinions. We'd love to hear from you!

-Spence