What characters do must grow out of who they are, and who they are is, in turn, influenced by what you make happen to them.

Conflict is the place where character and plot intersect.

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

You must learn to be three people at once: writer, character, and reader.

What characters do must grow out of who they are, and who they are is, in turn, influenced by what you make happen to them.

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

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.