In “Thirty Recommendations for Good Writing Habits,” an essay published in 2013, the writer and translator Lydia Davis offers a cardinal rule: “work on your character.” (She happened on a variation of ...

Did you know that George RR Martin, the mastermind behind the epic “A Song of Ice and Fire” series, often writes multiple chapters for each character consecutively? This non-linear approach helps him ...

This is part of Help! Wanted, a special series from Slate advice. In the advising biz, there are certain eternal dilemmas that bedevil letter writers and columnists alike. This week, we’re taking them ...

Every time I turn around, Jami Attenberg has published another novel or memoir. But I do not begrudge her this, because I know how she does it. For years, Jami has enlisted conspirators in writing a ...

Writing can feel like both a thrilling adventure and an uphill climb. Whether you’re staring at a blank page, wrestling with self-doubt, or juggling too many ideas to count, the process of creating ...

If you open up a Twitter thread or an advice column for graduate writing, you’ll probably see advice such as “Just write.” “You can’t edit a blank page.” “Put words on paper—even if they’re terrible, ...

All advice is suspect. I'm not suggesting you break all the so-called rules of creativity you've collected. Only that every tip can be counteracted with its opposite. And some advice is just plain bad ...

The thinking seemed to be that the more fancy words and complex sentence structures they could shoehorn into an essay, the greater their likelihood of getting an A. Much of my job consisted of ...

Our March/April 2021 pick for Now Read This, the PBS NewsHour's book club with The New York Times, is Jessica Bruder's "Nomadland," which chronicles the lives of older workers on the road. It served ...

I recently left my legal career of nearly 12 years to pursue my writing. Things began decently enough, but slowly backslid into a general apathy and laziness that I can’t seem to snap out of. Without ...

This is One Thing, a column with tips on how to live. Growing up in Saudi Arabia, I learned cursive with a fountain pen in the third grade as part of the standard curriculum. I wasn’t good at school, ...