How To Write, Chapter I

lol

Hello, friends.

This is maybe my most-requested newsletter of all time, so here goes nothing: so you want to read about writing, huh? You want to read about How To Write? Well, me too.

I am such a sucker for understanding how other people do this job. I always want to know how people write. This is partly because I am nosy (I also love any What’s In Your Bag/Fridge/Bedroom type article) and partly because this job is so lonely sometimes that I love to feel like I have colleagues. I love to feel like we are all in it together.

And, conversely, I love to open up this murky little place in which I live most of my life. There is not a lot of light in writing. We are all squirrelled away in holes tappy-tapping out our secrets like schoolgirls. (Fun, though, no?) But it is nice to lift the lid off sometimes.

That’s why I love Substack— you email me, I email you!— and especially the comments section. My natural home on the internet was Twitter (RIP) and before that…forums. I love to talk about writing with people who want to talk about writing, and I have had a real flurry of emails and messages from people asking me to write here about My Writing Process™. What do I do? How do I do it?