Dear you: When writing a novel (again), remember...

that if you aren't getting the words right—if you hear yourself saying to anyone who will listen, My sentences aren't working—you may be in the midst of a severe misdiagnosis. Sentences only work when the story is working. Sentences that don't pretty up or grit up or do whatever you want them to do are sentences that have no right frame to cling to.

Why this lesson has become my own personal Groundhog's Day, I'll never know.

But I share it with you, because you are smarter than I, than me.

Signed,

Not a Potter, Not a Ballroom Dancer, and Often Not a Writer