Do not write about your darling cat. Writing about your cat requires the verb phrase to lay. Searching for the correct tense to describe your darling cat in a sunbeam (“lies” or “laid”) will make it obvious that it’s not the cat you want to write about at all. Focus on the years you “lay,” “have lain,” or “had lain” in another’s bed, but use to sleep. To sleep is less upsetting to conjugate, and readers will still understand that you slept around.
Do not write about time passing. No one is interested in an OWL’s musings on time. Unsure if this advice applies to you? Do you make up acronyms assuming others can read your mind? Are you an Old White Lady referring to herself as an OWL? If yes, please proceed to the advice below. If no, please proceed to the advice below.
Made-up acronyms must be explained. In fiction, it is important to explore your character’s inner monologue, which you can do with made-up acronyms. Remember to explain them. For example, if a character sees her reflection in a mammogram technician’s booth and says, “Holy shit, I’ve turned into OIL!” you must spell out Old Italian Lady.
Do not use emoticons. Do not use a frowny face when forwarding your manuscript to an editor. Do not write “frowny face” either. You’re too old to use emoticons in emails or literary fiction. In fact, no one calls them emoticons, they’re emojis now and have been for years. Plus, whether you use one or not, all editors picture writers faces as frowny.
Do not write about trains. Whether train-riding is supposed to evoke a sexual experience or show the passage of time, no one wants to read about it if it involves a middle-aged woman. Please note that referring to yourself as a “middle-aged woman” will not negate your surprise the first time you’re called “ma’am,” which, if you are a city dweller, is likely to occur on a train.
Do not let margins derail your book. If an editor requests larger margins to notate all that’s wrong with your book, don’t overreact. Think about how few Great American Novels are written in proportion to lousy ones. Join the majority! Your iIllogical and strange manuscript can be reframed as daring and original! And if the protagonist is based on you, and your editor says she’s grossly unlikeable, change your personality!
Embrace your inner trope. A trope comforts readers because they know what to expect. To begin, examine the great loves of your life. Like sex, alcohol, and words. The second usually leads to the first, which leads to the last, which makes you a writer and a recovering alcoholic and sleeping only with words and a trope.
Avoid alcohol clichés. Can of beer in a brown paper bag. Bottle in a brown paper bag. The bottom of a bottle. Instead, write of a teeny-tiny, middle-aged, she-pirate drinking seltzer inside a model ship in a bottle.
Do not ever write the words That Ship Has Sailed in that exact order. You may trick your reader into reading those words by moving them around. Ship Has That Sailed is acceptable. Sailed Has Ship That is also acceptable, although your reader will not have a clue what you are saying. It is acceptable that your reader not have a clue what you are saying. You will appear deep and mysterious and full of potential, even though you’re an old, unpublished slut.
Don’t use profanity such as slut. To use profanity such as slut is distasteful and a reflection of a non-literary mind. However, if you are a teeny-tiny, middle-aged, she-pirate drinking seltzer inside a model ship in a bottle, slut is encouraged.
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Rumpus original art by Natalie Peeples
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