R. J. Hendrickson says:
Fascinating. Of course, the e-book writer is almost on his own, but thankfully there is a...
Jeremy says:
Good hell–I thought all they did was mark up my scene breaks and tell me I use italics too much....
Derek says:
It turns out Barnes & Noble DOES have it in stock. You have to search for “The War of...
Derek says:
It turns out Barnes & Noble does have the Black Irish edition, you have to search for “The War...
Laura says:
Well THAT certainly got some rusted gears turning! Thanks, Steven.
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I thought I’d get back “on message” this week with an inside baseball piece on traditional book publishing. Then I discovered something interesting.
I re-read Steve’s description of the “What It Takes” series from December 2010: “What It Takes” will bring you in on the meetings, the marketing and publicity, what works and doesn’t work—everything. Expect a play-by-play as the campaign unfolds. (more…)
Last week’s post, this week’s and next’s all come from Do The Work, our new book that comes out, on amazon.com only, a week from today. The e-version is available for free right now, though it won’t go “live” till pub day.
The cover of "Do The Work"—from a Van Gogh charcoal sketch.
At that time, a hardback and an audio version will go on sale, along with a collectible. By the way, you don’t need an e-reader to download an e-book; it’ll work on your iPad, your Mac or PC, your Android. Here’s a link to free apps that make this work.
But enough salesmanship. Let’s get down to today’s post:
I was talking last week about the Foolscap Method of getting a project started. The idea is to beat Resistance by forcing yourself to boil the whole shooting match down to one page—a sheet of yellow foolscap, a cocktail napkin, the back of an envelope.
Our project is what we want to get down. But how do we do it?
Here’s a trick that screenwriters use:
Three-act structure. (more…)
PART THREE
INNER WARS
Chapter 21 Casualties of War
All of us know brothers and sisters who have fought with incredible courage on the battlefield, only to fall apart when they came home.
Jeremy Renner as "Sgt. James" in The Hurt Locker. He had a hard time coming home.
Why? Is it easier to be a soldier than to be a civilian?
For the warrior, all choices have consequences. His decisions have meaning; every act he takes is significant. What he says and does can save (or cost) his own life or the lives of his brothers. The nineteen-year-old squad leader and the twenty-three-year-old lieutenant often exercise more power (and in spheres of greater and more instant consequence) than their fathers, who are fifty and have been working honorably and diligently their entire lives.
Is adrenaline addictive? Is the fight? Are these tours of combat, hellish as they may feel in the moment, the best years of our lives?
Chapter 22 The Civilian World
Spartans and Romans and Macedonians, Persians and Mongols, Apache and Sioux, Masai and Samurai and Pashtun all share one advantage over us Americans:
They were (and are) warrior cultures embedded within warrior societies.
This is not the case in the United States.
The American military is a warrior culture embedded within a civilian society. (more…)
