There’s nothing more satisfying than reading writing advice from someone who has something truly wonderful to share. Conversely, there’s nothing more disheartening than someone, posing as an “authority” on writing, sharing his/her deep and penetrating wisdom on “the craft” which is riddled with grammatical errors and sloppy information.

Today, I attended a helpful seminar on querying literary agents. In the wake of that, Google feed me a link to “22 books ALL writers MUST read.” This blog post used “its” where “it’s” was needed and repeated essential book #11 after promoting it in slot #3. Seriously, this sort of hackneyed advice makes me wonder just how many writers are being taken for a ride. This simply bums me out.

Writing is hard.

Having people respect and enjoy one’s writing is even harder.

To have folks promote the “MUST” reads in order to gain success in the business of writing, only to illustrate their own inelegance is nothing short of writer malpractice. Additionally, it only serves to make writers feel even more isolated and confused as to what is necessary and what is superfluous.

How about we proofread and promote and endorse instead of making writers feel as though they are not equipped to share their thoughts and express their creativity? There is no secret to becoming a “great writer.” Nowhere does there exist a truism in “if you do these things, then you will be regarded as a ‘real writer.'”

There is no special formula that will work for everyone. But even if there were, it ought not be shot though with errors and grammatical mistakes.

For all those writers out there (in fact, for all those creative people in any medium), trust yourself, know yourself, and work your ass off. That’s how you get it done.

Be true, be real, be you.