There are two wrong reactions to a rejection slip: deciding it's a final judgment on your story and/or talent, and deciding it's no judgment on your story and/or talent.

Religious reverence for one's own job, even if the job is worth doing, is a sexual turnoff.

Technology is Darwinian. It spreads. It evolves. It adapts. The most dangerous wipes out the less fit.

Fiction is about stuff that's screwed up.

You think intelligence and grit can succeed by themselves, but I'm telling you that's a pretty illusion.

In commercial fiction especially, everything in the story usually contributes directly to the plot The shorter the story, the truer this is

Anything said in upper-crust British automatically sounded intelligent.