Anyone who can write a good novel can write a good short story; but manyone who can write a good short story cannot write a novel at all. A novel takes sustained effort over a period of months or years. Harlan Ellison and Gardner Dozois are fine short-story writers, but cannot – apparently – write novels.

All writing is an act of courage. A novelist is like a cop or a soldier. To be brave is not enough. He or she must be brave today and brave tomorrow, and brave the next day, and the next.

If at all possible, you should work everyday, even if it is only for ten minutes. You can't do much in ten minutes, but ten minutes of real work will keep your mind focused on your novel. And that's vital.

Forget yourself. It doesn't matter what the agent, the editor, or the reader thinks of you.

Don't worry about your mother. If your book isn't published, she won't see it. If it is, she'll think you're wonderful, and so will I.

People who wait for inspiration write one book in the course of a lifetime, if that. Work hard and fast, and inspiration will hurry to catch up.

A ‘normal’ novel is about 80,000 words, or approximately 320 pages of typescript. Longer is better. The minimum is 40,000. There is no maximum. However …

Really long novels make more money if they are cut up into trilogies, series, or whatever.

Novels are where the money is. Thus, writers who have made a name for themselves write novels, mostly, leaving the short story field open for you.

It is very difficult to sell a short story collection without having at least one successful novel.

Novels can be published electronically, but there is no money in it so far.

All successful novels are about character, except for those that are about plot. Or place. Or dogs or something.

Plot is better than no plot, but no plot is better than too much plot.

Great novels are concerned with love and death, lesser novels with sex and violence.

Love and death are sex and violence, handled by a great novelist.