New Year’s Writing Advice and Inspiration

I don’t do New Year’s resolutions, but I’m a sucker for writing advice this time of year.

So, here is a little inspiration for anyone else who’s feeling a little anxious about everything that didn’t get done in 2019.  

Here’s to a new decade and new adventures!

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Don’t try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It’s the one and only thing you have to offer.

― Barbara Kingsolver

All of writing is a huge lake. There are great rivers that feed the lake, like Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. And there are mere trickles, like Jean Rhys. All that matters is feeding the lake. I don’t matter. The lake matters. You must keep feeding the lake.

―  Jean Rhys

If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.
― Toni Morrison

We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.
― Kurt Vonnegut

You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.
― Jack London

 What and how much had I lost by trying to do only what was expected of me instead of what I myself had wished to do?

 ― Ralph Ellison

When things get tough, this is what you should do. Make good art. I’m serious. Husband runs off with a politician? Make good art. Leg crushed and then eaten by mutated boa constrictor? Make good art. IRS on your trail? Make good art. Cat exploded? Make good art. Somebody on the Internet thinks what you do is stupid or evil or it’s all been done before? Make good art. Probably things will work out somehow, and eventually time will take the sting away, but that doesn’t matter. Do what only you do best. Make good art.

―  Neil Gaiman

A word after a word after a word is power.

― Margaret Atwood