The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.
– Terry Pratchett
Write freely and as rapidly as possible and throw the whole thing on paper. Never correct or rewrite until the whole thing is down.
—John Steinbeck
First Draft
Category: Writing
Taglines sell books…
…just as headlines sell newspapers.
One thing I’ve learned about self-publishing is that the quality of your book often does not determine how well it sells.
Marketers always sell the sizzle — not the steak. And no one knows this better than the headline writers at the New York Post.
Two billionaires — Jeff Bezos of Amazon and the Washington Post and David Pecker of the National Enquirer — have a spat. Bezos complains that stories in the National Enquirer are politically motivated. The Enquirer tries to blackmail Bezos with sensitive information when Bezos decides to publicize the information himself.
If Bezos wasn’t afraid of the blackmail threat. was there even a story here? Let’s see how the New York Post covered it…
Genius.
Hold Fast to Dreams
Hold fast to dreams. For if dreams die, life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly.
– Langston Hughes
Hitting the Mark…
The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.
—Mark Twain
Maugham on Writing
If you can tell stories, create characters, devise incidents, and have sincerity and passion, it doesn’t matter a damn how you write.
—W. Somerset Maugham
Maugham’s Secret Rules
Who’s on first? Truman Capote on Writing
I always write the end of everything first. Then I go back to the beginning. I mean, it’s always nice to know where you’re going, is my theory.
—Truman Capote
Intuition
“Your intuition knows what to write, so get out of the way.”
— Ray Bradbury
Imagination
“Imagination is like a muscle. I found out that the more I wrote, the bigger it got.”
— Philip Jose Farmer
Wit
I would challenge you to a battle of wits, but I see you are unarmed.
P. K. ABBOT THRILLERS 