Nothing was truly unbearable if you had something to read.
Actually, the Sniper's sense of humor frightened Amy more than anything else. The parody of Carla's poem had been witty, the rudeness of Marvy's critique outlandish, and she was still, for some reason, focused on that "youse" in the Sniper's counterf...
But all this was beside the point. What scared Amy was the mere fact of what looked inescapably like recreational malevolence. The poem had been written by an adult, not some teen with an unfinished brain. Whoever wrote the line intended damage, unde...
...(W)here there's drama, there's crap.
Just start the sentence...and see what happens. This is how we write.
Arithmetic is the death of story.
Carla was wearing a No Fear sweatshirt. You are too old, Amy wanted to tell her, for legible clothing.
(N)ot writing was hard work, almost as hard as writing.
(D)ialogue is generally the worst choice for exposition. 'When you're writing lines...you need to focus on the way people actually talk. And when we talk to each other we never actually explain our terms. We don't say 'Sweetheart, would you pass me t...
(T)here are worse things than falling on your face right out of college...Like instant, unearned success. Like getting your first novel accepted by the first publisher you send it to. Like getting your first rejection slip at the age of thirty-five.
(T)hey were at ease with each other, which was essential to a productive workshop.
