When you print out your manuscript and read it, marking up with a pen, it sometimes feels like a criminal returning to the scene of a crime.

I've found the best way to revise your own work is to pretend that somebody else wrote it and then to rip the living shit out of it.

The best writers I've read possess oodles of self-doubt, yet claw their way up with each work and remain humble. Boastful ones, not so much.

You're never as good a writer as you think you are, and you're never as bad. Just keep reading and writing, writing, writing.

When writing, I uncage KAT: Keep Adding Tension. Even if I don't know where the story's going, petting the KAT keeps it purring.

Writing a first-draft battle scene is akin to real combat—chaos, confusion, and you must keep your cool as you fire word bullets downrange.