Be Good
September 13, 2011
I think this is a good bit of advice for any new writer. Now don’t get me wrong, being original is great, important even. But focusing on being original is not the way to be original. Instead, I think the best thing a new writer can do is focus on being a good writer. Focus on craft. Focus on the technical aspects of writing rather than the next Big Thing. Because if you do come up with the idea of the century, you want to be a good enough writer to write it, don’t you?
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The Knitting Writer 
I don’t know if you remember me and Ian from Worldcon, but we were just talking about this the other day. He asked, “Is it a bad thing that (blank story) is basically just the combination of two things I love?” One was a show, the other was a video game. I thought about it a moment and told him, “No, because that was just the inspiration. The story all came from you.”
Of course I remember you both! I love that realization. So often I stumble across stories that are basically the same idea but because the writer had a voice and put their own hard work into it, they were both amazing. Besides, good artists copy and great artists steal right?