Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips Reston, Virginia – a planned community – now has no bookstore. What is wrong here? I live in Reston, Virginia. It is a planned community. It is a good community. There is a lot of educated, money-holding people in Reston. There is no bookstore in Reston, Virginia. Yes, we have a fine […]

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by Dwayne Phillips I have read it dozens of times – quit your job, do what you love, you will succeed. Oh really? I read something today that agrees with my experience: It takes money to start a freelance life. There – I wrote it. This disagrees with most of what I have read about […]

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by Dwayne Phillips As simple as it seems, I had to learn the zero-th law of fiction. I like to write fiction short stories. It’s fun for me. I have written 70 or so stories and have them on Smashwords which makes them available on many other outlets such as Barnes and Noble. I often […]

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by Dwayne Phillips As a writer and a person, I find it important to differentiate between me and something I wrote. I write a lot of things. Some of the things I write, especially those I write a my day job, are reviewed by others. I find one statement helps me and the reviewers: This […]

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by Dwayne Phillips When writing to convey information, I use a formula that is easy for me to remember and works for me. The formula is: what, so what, now what. Someone gave me this formula in a meeting years ago. The meeting had nothing to do with writing, but had something to do with […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Those three nouns in the post title continue to come to mind lo these many years since freshman English Composition. It was the summer of 1976 – yes, the Bicentennial summer. I was one month out of high school and taking freshman English composition. Dr. Gray taught the class. Two things stand […]

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by Dwayne Phillips I have few if any writing routines. Here is one I use: the one-hour sprint. I recently read an excellent post on the daily routines of famous writers. I have thought about such things for years. My conclusion? I have few if any writing routines. I write sitting on the couch, riding […]

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by Dwayne Phillips I try to write a few six-word stories and learn a few things. I have heard about six-word stories and stories written with only a few words. Okay, enough thinking and waiting; here are a few attempts. The window broke; I jumped out. I woke, he died, me too. The grandchildren visited. […]

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by Dwayne Phillips I find a web site that will create citations in different styles. I have blogged before about citing references in the APA style. I recently found a web site that creates citations for you in APA style as well as other styles. The site is called Son of Citation Machine. I guess […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Here is a photo of some excellent tools for writers. These aren’t exciting and certainly aren’t new. I consider them to be excellent tools because they are always with me and I can only use tools that are with me. When I notice something, I note it; I write a note on […]

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