Tag Archives: author life

GONE by Lisa McMann

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TITLE: GONE
AUTHOR: Lisa McMann

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★★
Story: ★★★★
Characters: ★★★★★
Appearance: ★★★★
Overall: ★★★★★ (4.5)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
Things should be great for Janie—she has graduated from high school and is spending her summer with Cabel, the guy she’s totally in love with. But deep down she’s panicking about how she’s going to survive her future when getting sucked into other people’s dreams is really starting to take its toll.

Things get even more complicated when she meets her father for the very first time—and he’s in a coma. As Janie uncovers his secret past, she begins to realize that the choice thought she had has more dire consequences than she ever imagined.

Buy it HERE on Amazon! 

BOOK BLURB:
OPEN YOUR EYES.

Janie thought she knew what her future held. And she thought she’d made her peace with it. But she can’t handle dragging Cabel down with her.

She knows he will stay with her, despite what she sees in his dreams. He’s amazing. And she’s a train wreck. Janie sees only one way to give him the life he deserves: She has to disappear. And it’s going to kill them both.

Then a stranger enters her life—and everything unravels. The future Janie once faced now has an ominous twist, and her choices are more dire than she’d ever thought possible. She alone must decide between the lesser of two evils. And time is running out…

EXCERPT FOR GONE:
He reaches toward her, his fingers black and bloody, his eyes deranged, unblinking. Janie is paralyzed. His cold hands reach around her neck, squeezing tight, tighter, until Janie has no breath left. She’s unable to move, unable to think. As his grasp tightens further around Janie’s neck, his face turns sickly alabaster. He strains harder and begins to shake.

Janie is dying.

She has no fight left in her.

It’s over.

THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: Out of all three of the books in this series, I think this is the only one that is truly YA. Lisa McMann’s writing style has been consistent and enjoyable although I think there were a few more typo’s and editing issues in this book than there were in the previous two books.

STORY: What would you do if out of nowhere the father you’ve never known is back in your life? The kicker… he is unconscious and dying.

Although I like the way GONE ended, it doesn’t feel like a true ending to the story. It seems like there could be another book to really tie up all the loose ends and give us closer with Janie and Cabel and what fate brings to her.

I’m looking forward to seeing what else Lisa McMann has written and what she come out with next.

APPEARANCE: There are two covers for this book. I have the simple black and green cover with the lonely chair in the middle. It is intriguing and grabbed my attention the moment I saw it. The other cover, with the photo of who I can only image is meant to be Janie and Cabel is not my favorite. I prefer to conger up the images of the characters on my own, as I read. These to people just don’t really bring the characters to life for me.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “I lurve you, too, you big lumpy monster man.”

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/egF8D-6DMyQ

My 2 Cents…Like Father

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Like Father

Movie: Like Father
Director: Lauren Miller Rogen
Writer: Lauren Miller Rogen (screenplay)
Story by: Anders Bard and Lauren Miller Rogen
Cast: Kristen Bell, Kelsey Grammer

IMDB DESCRIPTION:
A workaholic woman who is left at the altar takes her honeymoon trip away with her overachieving father who left her mother because he believed his family was holding back his career.

REVIEW:
I had no idea what to expect with this one, but I loved it!!!! I don’t think the online reviews do it justice. It’s a heartfelt story about realistic family relationships. Besides, with today’s society being so addicted to technology, I’m sure Bell’s character hits a little to close to home for many people.

Aside from being an amazing advertisement for Royal Caribbean cruises, the movie is about tragedy, loss, and failed expectations and how we overcome them.

There’s a great lesson to be learned all wrapped up in an entertaining package.

I say watch it! What do you say? Have you seen Like Father and I’d so, what did you think?

Watch the Movie Trailer Here:

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt7170950/?ref_=fn_al_tt_0

WWSKD – What Would Stephen King Do?

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It’s no secret… Stephen King is my favorite author and I just don’t see that changing any time soon. Now, it doesn’t mean I love everything he writes, because I don’t. However, I do love most of it!

The thing is, Stephen King is the author that made me first fall in love with reading. It was his books that got me through not only my youth but also some pretty tough times in my life. Lonely times.

So, as an author myself, I often turn to my “mentor” and seek his guidance. I ask WWSKD – What Would Stephen King Do? I’m actually thinking about getting #WWSKD bracelets made… I wonder if other authors think the same thing. Maybe I should start a club… I digress.on writing

Stephen King has written at least 90 books… probably more. Check out his online library HERE! His books have sold more than 350 million copies. AMAZING, right?! It doesn’t matter if you love them, like them or even hate them, you have to admit 90+ books is impressive. He has even written the manual on writing… literally! In his book, On Writing Stephen King shares all his thoughts on writing including his ‘rules’ which he admits, like most authors, even he breaks from time to time too.

 

He also shares a lot of advice for aspiring writers. I’ve picked some of my favorite quotes and shared them here:

  1. “You don’t need writing classes or seminars any more than you need this or any other book on writing. Faulkner learned his trade while working in the Oxford, Mississippi post office. Other writers have learned the basics while serving in the Navy, working in steel mills or doing time in America’s finer crossbar hotels. I learned the most valuable (and commercial) part of my life’s work while washing motel sheets and restaurant tablecloths at the New Franklin Laundry in Bangor. You learn best by reading a lot and writing a lot, and the most valuable lessons of all are the ones you teach yourself.”
  2. “While to write adverbs is human, to write ‘he said’ or ‘she said’ is divine.”
  3. “Language does not always have to wear a tie and lace-up shoes. The object of fiction isn’t grammatical correctness but to make the reader welcome and then tell a story… to make him/her forget, whenever possible, that he/she is reading a story at all.”
  4. “Timid writers like passive verbs for the same reason that timid lovers like passive partners. The passive voice is safe. The timid fellow writes “The meeting will be held at seven o’clock” because that somehow says to him, ‘Put it this way and people will believe you really know. ‘Purge this quisling thought! Don’t be a muggle! Throw back your shoulders, stick out your chin, and put that meeting in charge! Write ‘The meeting’s at seven.’ There, by God! Don’t you feel better?”
  5. “You have to read widely, constantly refining (and redefining) your own work as you do so. If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write.”
  6. “A radio talk-show host asked me how I wrote. My reply—’One word at a time’—seemingly left him without a reply. I think he was trying to decide whether or not I was joking. I wasn’t. In the end, it’s always that simple. Whether it’s a vignette of a single page or an epic trilogy like ‘The Lord Of The Rings,’ the work is always accomplished one word at a time.”
  7. “There should be no telephone in your writing room, certainly no TV or videogames for you to fool around with. If there’s a window, draw the curtains or pull down the shades unless it looks out at a blank wall.”
  8. “When you write a story, you’re telling yourself the story. When you rewrite, your main job is taking out all the things that are not the story. Your stuff starts out being just for you, but then it goes out.”
  9. “If you’ve never done it before, you’ll find reading your book over after a six-week layoff to be a strange, often exhilarating experience. It’s yours, you’ll recognize it as yours, even be able to remember what tune was on the stereo when you wrote certain lines, and yet it will also be like reading the work of someone else, a soul-twin, perhaps. This is the way it should be, the reason you waited. It’s always easier to kill someone else’s darlings that it is to kill your own.”
  10. “Mostly when I think of pacing, I go back to Elmore Leonard, who explained it so perfectly by saying he just left out the boring parts. This suggests cutting to speed the pace, and that’s what most of us end up having to do (kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your ecgocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.)”
  11. “Writing isn’t about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end, it’s about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own life, as well. It’s about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Writing is magic, as much the water of life as any other creative art. The water is free. So drink.”

Wake by Lisa McMann

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TITLE: WAKE
AUTHOR: Lisa McMann

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★
Story: ★★★★
Characters: ★★★★
Appearance: ★★★★
Overall: ★★★★ (4)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
Not all dreams are sweet.

For seventeen-year-old Janie, getting sucked into other people’s dreams is getting old. Especially the falling dreams, the naked-but-nobody- notices dreams, and the sex-crazed dreams. Janie’s seen enough fantasy booty to last her a lifetime.

She can’t tell anybody about what she does — they’d never believe her, or worse, they’d think she’s a freak. So Janie lives on the fringe, cursed with an ability she doesn’t want and can’t control.

Then she falls into a gruesome nightmare, one that chills her to the bone. For the first time, Janie is more than a witness to someone else’s twisted psyche. She is a participant….

Buy it HERE on Amazon! 
THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: This is a quick read. The style is unique in that it is broken down by date and time instead of chapters. It starts when Janie is a little girl and moves quickly with large breaks in time. Then, as she gets older and starts high school the breaks in time become smaller and smaller until they are hours or minutes apart. The result leaves the reader feeling like a voyeur, peaking in on Janie’s life. It is a very effective style for this story, but I don’t think it would work in every situation.

STORY: I picked this book up at a used bookstore, with no idea what it was about. When I read the back cover, I was instantly intrigued. As an author, about six months ago, I outlined a story idea that had to do with entering other people’s dreams. So, finding a book that dealt with the same topic, although very different, was exciting.

Overall, I think the story was interesting. You can empathize with Janie, as well as the other characters. You’re emotionally invested as a reader and want to know how Janie and Cabel will get out of their crappy home life situations and where the story will take them. There is a twist… which I will not give away… but it allows you some closure. If there were a stand-alone book, it would work. However, it isn’t and I’m very excited to read book 2 (FADE) which I had to order online. Book 3 (GONE) was available at the used bookstore and I picked it up when I bought this one. So, I’ll be reading that one soon enough.

APPEARANCE: There are two covers for this book. I have the simple back cover with the floating pillow and purple text. I love the simplicity of this cover – it was the reason I picked up the book in the first place. The second cover (see above) probably wouldn’t have caught my eye. I may have missed out on this book all together.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “Your seat adjustor you ass. We have to pull them together. It’s a bench seat. As you can see.”

I’m not really sure why this is my favorite quote. It just made me laugh really hard when I read it. I suppose it was just the perfect line to show the true Janie and how comfortable she was in that moment. There are other lines, ones with more emotion, more sentiment, more… just more, but this one made me laugh.

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/zSrvcuhzqcc

When Are You the Most Creative?

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creative thinking

Do you have a specific time of day when you feel you’re at your creative peak? Is there a place you go to get a quick surge of creativity? Or, is it an activity you do that helps you put your creative thinking cap on?

I read that studies have shown; people are typically at their most creative in the late evening hours and at their least creative late afternoon/early evening. Well, I don’t know about you, but I’ve always found that my best ideas come to either while I’m in the shower (morning, afternoon, or evening), while I’m on a road trip, or when I’m half asleep. It seem ironic to me that in all three cases I am, more often than not, unable to jot down my thoughts… unless I’m a rider not a driver! I’m an author… I can’t let my most creative moments pass me by! 

The thing is, I don’t really believe that this is something a “study” can tell us. Everyone is different. I’m typically a morning person, while my husband is typically a night owl. I say typically because life… jobs… kids… they often dictate what type of lifestyle we have to adjust to, but that doesn’t mean we enjoy it. I do believe however, that there are certain times of the day when we feel the most creative and other times when creativity seems impossible. I just believe the ‘creative zone’ happens at different times for everyone.  

The truth is, it doesn’t matter when or where you feel you’re at your most creative. What matters is that you know when/where that is ,so you can use it to your advantage. Below I’ve listed a few tips on how you can figure out what your most creative times of the day are, where you’re most creative, and what activities spark your most creative thoughts/ideas. 

TAKE NOTE:
Keep a “creativity log” to track your tasks. When tracking project progress, you want to jot down when the project started, when/where you worked on it, and when you finished. Long periods of time spent working on one task is typically a sign that you were focused and in a creative zone. However, taking a long time to complete a task because you are working on it sporadically may indicate you were distracted, un-focused, and not in a creative time/space. Tracking tasks from week to week will allow you to determine your most creative times/locations each day and which days you tend to be the most productive.

BE FLEXIBLE AND SCHEDULE YOUR TIME WISELY:
In order to use your creative time the most productively, you may want to consider juggling your schedule a bit. Whether it’s at work or home, make sure you are scheduling fun, creative tasks during the hours you feel your most alert and focused. Use this time to write, create, or work – if that’s what you’re passionate about. Just make sure you are spending your most creative time of day on creative tasks.

PLAN AHEAD:
Once you know when your creativity is most likely to sneak up on you – like me in the shower or on a nice long road trip – you can start to plan for it. For me, I always have a pen and notebook with me… yes, even in the bathroom. That way, if inspiration hits me, I can jot down my thoughts as soon as I jump out of the shower. Whenever it is that creativity seems to be at its peak for you, you need to be prepared. So, think about how you can plan for that next inspiring moment. 

Do you have suggestions on using your creative time wisely? Comment below and share when you’re most creative and how you make sure to never let inspiration slip by!

The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks

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Notebook

TITLE: The Notebook
AUTHOR: Nicholas Sparks

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★★
Story: ★★★★★
Characters: ★★★★★
Appearance: ★★★★★
Overall: ★★★★★ (5)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
Every so often a love story so captures our hearts that it becomes more than a story-it becomes an experience to remember forever. The Notebook is such a book. It is a celebration of how passion can be ageless and timeless, a tale that moves us to laughter and tears and makes us believe in true love all over again… At thirty-one, Noah Calhoun, back in coastal North Carolina after World War II, is haunted by images of the girl he lost more than a decade earlier. At twenty-nine, socialite Allie Nelson is about to marry a wealthy lawyer, but she cannot stop thinking about the boy who long ago stole her heart. Thus begins the story of a love so enduring and deep it can turn tragedy into triumph, and may even have the power to create a miracle…

Buy it HERE on Amazon! 

BOOK JACKET BLURB:
THE NOTEBOOK is an achingly tender story about the enduring power of love, a story of miracles that will stay with you forever.

Set amid the austere beauty of coaster North Carolina in 1946, THE NOTEBOOK begins with the story of Noah Calhoun, a rural Southerner returned home from World War II. Noah, thirty-one, is restoring a plantation home to its former glory, and he is haunted by images of the beautiful girl he met fourteen years earlier, a girl he loved like no other. Unable to find her, yet unwilling to forget the summer they spent together, Noah is content to live with only memories… until she unexpectedly returns to his town to see him once again.

Allie Nelson, twenty-nine, is not engaged to another man, but realizes that the original passion she felt for Noah has not dimmed with the passage of time. Still, the obstacles that once ended their previous relationship remain, and the gulf between their worlds is too vast to ignore. With her impending marriage only weeks away, Allie is forced to confront her hopes and dreams for the future, a future that only she can shape.

Like a puzzle within a puzzle, the story of Noah and Allie is just the beginning. As it unfolds, their tale miraculously becomes something different, with much higher stakes. The result is a deeply moving portrait of love itself, the tender moments and the fundamental changes that affect us all. Shining with a beauty that is rarely found in current literature, THE NOTEBOOK establishes Nicholas Sparks as a classic storyteller with a unique insight into the only emotion that really matters.

THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: Nicholas Sparks has a way of transporting you, emotionally, into a world all his own. When I cracked the spine of this book, I found it hard to put it down. I was reluctant to leave Noah and Allie, wanting—needing—to know what would happen next in their epic adventure. If it weren’t for Sparks’ amazing writing style and his ability to engage the reader on a deeply emotional level, this could have been just about any other love story filling the Romance shelf of your local book store. Yet it isn’t. The Notebook stands out among the others as a true classic in my eyes.

STORY: WOW… Just WOW! I was delighted to find out that this story was based on the lives of Nicholas Sparks’ wife’s grandparents. To know that this kind of deep… unbendable… love exists doesn’t surprise me, as I am truly, madly, deeply in love with my own husband. However, to know that this kind of love, can withstand even the hardest of obstacles thrown at it, gives love a whole new meaning. I imagine this to be the kind of love my own fraternal grandparents must have shared. I remember as a child, watching them look into each other’s eyes in such a loving, longing way. Years into their marriage, and long past their youth, they still loved each other just as much as the day they first realized their love existed.

Nicholas Sparks’ story is a love story to which all love stories should be measured by. I won’t give anything away, because although I am tempted to tell you all about the story, from start to end, this is one book I don’t want to ruin for you. I want you to read it for yourself. I want you to experience it first hand, take the journey with Noah and his beloved, and find out what fourteen years apart can do to the “love” they shared during their fairytale summer romance.

APPEARANCE: The cover is simple, the view from Noah’s front porch. At first glance, the cover reminded me of On Golden Pond by Ernest Thompson. The cover didn’t draw me in, at first, but as I read I longed to sit on that porch and see the world through Noah’s eyes.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “…But most of all, I learned that life is about sitting on benches next to ancient creeks with my hand on her knee and sometimes, on good days, for falling in love.”

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/SIPhi_g1d10

Check out the official movie trailers here:

https://youtu.be/yDJIcYE32NU
https://youtu.be/FC6biTjEyZw

Scenes from the movie:

https://youtu.be/Z22EAeIIZM0
https://youtu.be/E1I0hAxGFXw
https://youtu.be/EemLsTG5fX8

4 KEY INGREDIENTS FOR A STRONG BOOK LAUNCH & CONSISTENT SALES

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woman reading book

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

KEY INGREDIENTS FOR A STRONG BOOK LAUNCH AND CONSISTENT BOOK SALES:

• Cover Design – YES, people do judge books by their covers! The cover is your books first impression, if people don’t like it they aren’t going to pick it up to read the back blurb (2nd impression).

• Detailed Editing – The more editing the better! Readers will give your book on average 1-3 chapters to impress them, often less.

• Strong Story – Some editing issues can be forgiven as long as your story is strong.

• Marketing – You should start marketing your book at least 6 months prior to the actual book release date.

I want to know your thoughts too!!! Comment below and share your suggestions for ensuring a successful book launch and consistent sales after your book has been published!

Pretty Little Dead Girls by Mercedes M. Yardley

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Pretty

TITLE: Pretty Little Dead Girls
AUTHOR: Mercedes M. Yardley

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★
Story: ★★★★
Characters: ★★★
Appearance: ★★★★
Overall: ★★★★ (3.5)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
“Run, Star Girl.” Bryony Adams is destined to be murdered, but fortunately Fate has terrible marksmanship. In order to survive, she must run as far and as fast as she can. After arriving in Seattle, Bryony befriends a tortured musician, a market fish-thrower, and a starry-eyed hero who is secretly a serial killer bent on fulfilling Bryony’s dark destiny. Mercedes M. Yardley’s Pretty Little Dead Girls: A Novel of Murder and Whimsy is a dark, lovely fairy tale with lyrical language and a high body count, and features a cover by Hugo award-winner Galen Dara. Includes “Oliver Bloom” by Ryan Johnson, a short story featuring characters from Pretty Little Dead Girls.

Buy it HERE on Amazon! 

THE CRITICAL POINTS

Let me start by saying I know I’m in a minority with this book review. I’ve seen the amazon reviews… Pretty Little Dead Girls has an average of 5 stars with 82 reviews and that is awesome! I guess this narrative style of writing just really isn’t my cup of tea. Or maybe it isn’t the narration, its more that every character seems to have the same voice… but more of that later, when I talk about characters. 

With all that said – I still think that Mercedes M Yardley is a talented writer, and I do plan on reading more of her work.

WRITING: I have never read anything like this… The author writes from a narrator’s point of view, but instead of standing outside the story and telling you what happens, the narrator speaks directly to the reader. Addressing the reader, outside the context of the story, is very jarring.

STORY: Right from the start of the story, the reader is intrigued. We’re told that Bryony is the type of girl who gets murdered. We don’t know why, but we accept it as truth. Starting on page one, you are drawn in and you start searching each new character you meet to find out if they might be the one to murder Bryony.

This is when the story falls apart for me. I’m intrigued by the concept of the story, the idea that this girl has a destiny that is so plainly clear to everyone, but it’s never explained. We never – throughout the whole book – learn why she is destined to be murdered or who EVERYONE KNOWS IT! The whole story is about how she is destined to be murdered, everyone knows it and tries to protect her, and how she escapes her destiny as people around her die.

I just felt like the potential was there for this to be a really amazing story, but it fell flat for me.

CHARACTERS: I’m not really sure how to describe the characters in this book. Honestly, they all feel the same, other than Bryony. Because everything is told from the Narrator’s point of view, everyone seems to speak in the same voice. I think the part that really threw me, was when there was a full conversation, between Bryony (our lead) and the Murderer, using only eye contact. A conversation that was so absurd… so ridiculous in the moment… that it pulled me right out of the story. This is only one example of many, where I found myself shaking my head and asking myself, “why am I still reading?” Yet, I read it from page one until the end. 

APPEARANCE: The cover was designed by Galen Dara, and the artwork is truly beautiful. Reading the story, I didn’t really envision Bryony looking like the girl on the cover, but that didn’t take anything away from the book for me.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “Bryony Adams was the type of girl who got murdered.” It’s the first sentence of the book and immediately draws you in.

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/7PRSrwVQ8RY

101 MORE REASONS To Break Up by J Edward Neill

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101 Reasons

TITLE: 101 MORE REASONS To Break Up
AUTHOR: J Edward Neill

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★
Story: ★★★
Characters: ★★★
Appearance: ★★★
Overall: ★★★ (3)

 

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
You think YOUR relationships have been crazy? Think again.

In 101 MORE Reasons to Break Up, dozens of people are interviewed about their best, worst, and weirdest break-ups.

Every one of the tales is real, and each one is crazier than the one before. Affairs, love-triangles, and nutty behavior? Nothing is taboo in these weird, wild break-ups. Once you read one, you’ll want to read them all!

This is the sequel to the original 101 Reasons to Break Up

Buy it HERE on Amazon! 

THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: There isn’t really much here to critique in terms of writing. As a compilation of 101 short stories (1-3 paragraphs each), told from the perspective of the real-life person involved in the break-up, Neill only had to transcribe their experiences. There were some editing issues splattered throughout the book, but nothing so terrible that I put the book down.

STORY: Some of the stories were entertaining, but mostly they were a combination of sad, embarrassing, dull, and even horrifying. It only took me a couple of hours to read… My suggestion – take it with you on your next flight, read it and leave it in the seat back pocket for the next traveler to enjoy.

APPEARANCE: Beautiful cover!

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/ViUcgEQ4lZM

Tips from famous authors…

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art business close up decor

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

If you do a google search for the best tips for new authors, you’ll be inundated with a ton of advice. Some suggestions will be good… others, not so much. Below are some of my favorite tips from famous authors out there:

  1. Be open to criticism – Be it from your peers, your beta readers, and most importantly your editor. You have to be open to listening to your editor! (Stephen King)
  2. Write for yourself, not the market – Write what you care about. Don’t try to write for the market or just to sell. If you aren’t writing what your passionate about it will never sell. (Neil Gaiman)
  3. Practice makes perfect – Writing is like a sport. If you don’t practice you’ll never get better. Just a little bit every day – a page a day – will make you better. (Rick Riordan)
  4. Ask practical questions – The moment you make a decision about your story, a character choice, a plot choice, etc. you need to ask yourself practical questions about it. How will that work? How will it affect the characters? When you start asking yourself those types of practical questions and finding answers then the unrealistic becomes realistic. It becomes possible. (Salman Rushdie)
  5. Teach yourself that everything is interesting – A common desire for new writers is to edit everything, and although editing is VERY important, you don’t want to edit yourself as you write. Put everything into your story – everything is interesting – everything is important. You can edit out what really doesn’t matter at the end, when you’ve finished your first draft. (Malcolm Gladwell)

Watch the Reedsy video here: