Writing:

Sometimes, I don’t know why I chose the brutal career of writing. Perhaps, I need some “Moksha,” a Hindu word that means freedom from the world of ordinary experience.  If you are a writer, you are certainly not ordinary, and if you desire the “ordinary,” why on earth would you want to be a writer? I believe I was meant to be a writer, and I hope that this year God and fate will be good to me and help me produce more. By this time next year, I hope to have six books in print.  I have so much to learn though. This year, there are two books I especially need to read and ponder and memorize from to help me be a better writer and editor: The Fiction Dictionary and the Chicago Manual of Style.  I also need to reread John Dufresne’s book on fiction writing, The Lie that Tells a Truth.

Today, I’m off to East Texas. I just finished reading a prepublication copy of The Amethyst Stone by Marti Crisp, a young reader’s novel. I enjoyed it greatly and I’m sure it will do well. I’ll post publication information on this novel later.

QUOTATIONS:

Those who know me for any length of time, and certainly those who hear me teach or make speeches, will hear the following quotations. I have long lost the original sources:

“Experience is not the best teacher–it’s just the hardest teacher.”

“A friend is someone who knows all about you and still likes you.”

“Do the hardest task first.”