“Gone with the Wind,” color, 1939, happens to be starting on Turner Classic Movies as I write this article. I wondered what Margaret Mitchell, the author of the novel on which the movie was based, thought of the film so I did a little Google search....
Sometimes I’m asked what the opening of a prospective client’s book would be like. I explain that there are many ways to start a manuscript. Sometimes I mention Col. Hackworth’s best-selling memoir and its beginning. No, it didn’t begin in some...
Is it possible to write an unreadable book? Yes. How might one go about doing so? There are many things an author can do to mangle a manuscript. You can be way too repetitive. You can write like Donald Trump speaks: Incoherently. You can inflate a sentence to the...
And here comes our new president, Donald J. Trump. He has called on the carpet the bosses of news media and journalists and whipped them for writing stories that he believes are erroneous. The meeting was in secret but I imagine Trump laid out some threats. Mr. Trump...
I had no idea that Barack Obama curses before public speaking. I think I know at whom he curses before going on stage. I was as shocked to read that as I would have been to hear that 1950s-’60s movie star and cinematic symbol of chastity and virtue Doris Day...
