Tip 1: Vary Your Sentence Length

One sure way to put your readers to sleep is to write with constant-length sentences. Change the length for a better copy.

SHORT SENTENCE Copy:

"Times are bad. Economy's tanking. Latest figures are not good. Government published a report. It confirms the rumors. We're in a recession."

LONG SENTENCE Copy:

"We are going through some turbulent times these days. Our economy, which is supposed to be doing well according to some indicators, is showing strains of high unemployment and the effects of the sub-prime mortgage crisis. The latest figures quoted in leading industry journals and publications do not instill confidence in analysts and consumers alike. The Department of Commerce has just published a White Paper citing several Wall Street observers who claimed that we are nowhere near the end of this current impasse. Whether we like to admit it or not, the facts are staring us in the face: we seem to be sliding headlong into a recession the likes of which have not been since the '30s."

Let's mash up the two styles:

BETTER Copy:

"Times are bad. Our economy, which is supposed to be doing well according to some indicators, is showing strains of high unemployment and the effects of the sub-prime mortgage crisis. Economy's tanking? Perhaps. The latest figures quoted in leading industry journals and publications do not instill confidence. The Department of Commerce has just published a report which confirms the worst: we're in a recession."

Tip 2: Use Parallel Construction

When you are drawing up lists or forming compound sentences with multiple clauses, maintain the same grammatical structure in all parts.

If, for example, you start a list item with an action verb, start all the other items also with action verbs to ensure maximum comprehension and retention.

Here is a good example of a list:

Before you embark on a trip, make sure you:

* make a hotel reservation;

* take your pills;

* suspend paper delivery; and

* withdraw cash from the bank.

Make, Take, Suspend, Withdraw are all verbs in imperative (order) mode. The construction is "parallel."

A bad example:

Before you embark on a trip, make sure you:

* make a hotel reservation;

* your pills should be with you;

* paper delivery must be suspended; and

* have you visited the bank to withdraw some cash?.

Items start with a verb (make), a personal pronoun (your), a noun (paper), and another verb. The construction is not parallel. Such a list is harder to follow and remember.

Michael Douglas is “Charlie,” a jazz base player, a dreamer, and a loser who spends a few years in a mental institution for a tune-up from the neck-up.

His sixteen year old daughter Miranda ( Evan Rachel Wood) has lost half of her heart when her mom left the house years ago but she managed to learn how to take care of herself.

In a sense, father and daughter switched Emotional IQs over the intervening years – he became the child while she grew into what he should've been; the responsible one.

However, being responsible sometimes means burying one's dreams. That's an option Charlie has never entertained.

So it goes... no sooner than Charlie is released from the psychiatric ward he shares his life's ambition with Miranda: to find the long-lost treasure of a 17th century Spanish captain. He is dead serious about it and uses both his metal detector and ancient books about the era to convince Miranda.

(WARNING: plot points revealed.)

After her initial resistance, Miranda agrees to play along. This childish man is after all the only parent and possibly also the only friend she's got left in life.

But STOP! They have an obstacle in the shape of a giant Costco warehouse. The secret Spanish treasure is buried under that chunk of concrete, according to Charlie's best calculations.

Joined by his former band member Pepper (Willis Burks II), they hatch a plan.

After breaking into the Costco warehouse at night and digging at the “Mark of X,” the story takes a really bizarre turn.

At the bottom of the hole dug on the warehouse floor, Charlie and Miranda find a pool of water. Miranda is pretty sure it's the sewer. Charlie thinks it's a pool of sulfur hiding the sunken treasure ship.

By taking full advantage of Costco's shameless product placement, Charlie finds a diving suit and oxygen tank and dives right in.

At the end, Charlie finds the sunken treasure he was looking for. Miranda finds her treasure too, which is not minted in the 17th century: her new-found love for a man that showed her the correct way to live in life.

A sweet little feel-good flick with no ambitious agenda. Nothing here to set the House of Drama on fire. It delivers the 93 minutes of pleasant distraction that it promises at the outset.

Michael Douglas proves that his prodigious range as an actor covers sensitive mindful comedy as well. Written and directed by Mike Cahill.

Her name became synonymous with the name and success of the Cosmopolitan magazine as its longtime editor. She is the author of many bestsellers, including Sex and the Single Girl.

“The Writer’s Rules: The Power of Positive Prose – How to Create It and Get It Published” is one of my favorite reference books on writing for 2 reasons:

1) Its “Fifty Rules for First-Class Writing” is really a list that all professional writers should read at least once a year. I do.

2) The insight into how to get your articles published in magazines is unmatched. If you listen to HGB, the chances are you’ll be a publishing success no matter what your chosen field of specialization and expertise is.

Since I’m not much of a magazine article publisher, for me, the main value of the book is in the 50 rules that Brown lists and explains with appropriate examples.

Here are the Top Six Rules that she says are her favorite:

Rule #4: Stay with the subject.

Rule # 7: Vary sentence structure so you don’t keep seeing the same pronoun.

Rule #12: Avoid IT or THIS or THAT to refer to a situation a few sentences back … say this or that WHAT?

Rule #18: Eliminate as many THE’s, AND’s, A’s as you can.

Rule #19: Root out THERE IS at the beginning of the sentences.

Rule #43: Kill all the clichés and tired phrases.

Where else would find a list of “Forbidden Words and Tired Phrases” by topics, like “Animals” or “Money” or “Geography”?

Here are some of Brown’s rules for those trying to see their bylines in prestigious magazines; each rule explained in detail:

1. Research the market.
2. Send a query letter.
3. Make the deal.
4. Request an assignment letter.
5. Become intimate with your subject.
6. Write it right.
7. Pay attention to the deadline.

Also recommended are the excellent chapter on the lost art of letter writing and a collection of sample resumes that you can use when querying the magazine editors.

3:10 to Yuma tries to break the traditional Western-movie mold like Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven (1992) did. But at the end, 3:10 fails to solve one of the equations that it sets for itself in Act 1.

Basically this is another "delivering the criminal to justice" story with a "morality play" at its core.

Protagonist Dan Evans (Christian Bale) is a crippled Civil War veteran and loser of a farmer who cannot even command his own son’s respect.

He emerges as an unlikely hero turning down all incentives to betray himself. He resists the easy way out and sticks with a higher principle until the bitter end.

(WARNING: plot points revealed)

Time and place: Post-Civil War Arizona.

Dan Evans is a farmer with a wife, two boys, and a bad leg who struggles not to lose his ranch to men and nature. Rain is scarce and crops are bad. Plus, a local developer to whom Evans owes money is trying to push him off the land to resell it at a profit to the railroad company.

Into this picture, enters the cocky highway bandit Ben Wade (Russell "Gladiator" Crowe).

Wade is a cocky rotten apple with a Robin Hood complex. He believes killing, pillaging, and holding up stage coaches is nothing more than a “wealth re-distribution” project.

Our antagonist is caught after a bloody hold up. Evans signs up for $200 as one of the guards to take the toxic Wade to the train station in the faraway town of Contention.

The goal is to eventually put him on the “3:10 to Yuma,” the train that will take Wade to justice and probably to the gallows. That’s when things start to get interesting.

Wade’s psychotic posse tracks down the group in order to set Wade free. During the perilous trip to the train station, Wade and Evans, the prisoner and the guard, find themselves on the same side while fending off against the Indians and other unwelcomed parties. That’s when the line between the lawmen and the law-breaker gets blurred up.

Much of Act 2 and 3 is filled with The Chase. Guns are fired. Dynamites explode. Horses are ridden to exhaustion. Bodies start falling here, there and everywhere.

At the end the main plot (taking Ben Wade to justice) and the sub-plot (Evans trying to redeem himself in the eyes of his son) dovetail nicely. That’s the first equation and it’s solved to our satisfaction.

What does not work is what Wade does in the last scene. That’s the second equation that addresses Wade’s inner world and his psychology. What Wade does in the end is totally inexplicable given his career as a hardened criminal. That really comes across as a major let down, as a “neat solution” forced upon the story line for the sake of casting a heroic halo over the main antagonist.

We are living in a confusing world, don’t we? No wonder even the Westerns are confused these days.

My mom keeps telling me to “walk, don’t run” (which is, by the way, the title of Cary Grant’s very last movie shot in 1966).

I love my mom. But what she doesn’t know is, walking and running are like water and gasoline. They are two totally different categories of metabolic burn. Walking simply does nothing for me in terms of weight loss.

In my decade-long battle with fat, it always comes to this: I either get out and hit the pavement or watch myself turn into the Goodyear blimp, real fast.

Perhaps I should qualify my claim to “running”: I actually jog. What do you call a guy who runs 5K in 34 minutes and 10K in 73 minutes but a “jogger”?

I’m slow but steady. When I hit the road chugging, I turn into the Little Engine That Could.

Since I pretty much run the same 5K route for the last 6 or 7 years there are quite a few neighbors who know me by now. Sometimes I even get an encouraging word or two, especially when the weather is bad. They seem to take pity on the fool who keeps launching one attack after another in the Battle of the Bulge.

The most important thing to take care of in your running program is to have the right SHOES. No money spent is too much when it comes to having a pair of good fitting and light running shoes.

My preferred brand is New Balance. They are not only the lightest running shoes I’ve had but they are all made in the good’old USA as well. So by buying NB instead of Nike I know I’m helping some American worker somewhere take food to his or her home. That makes me feel even better as I enjoy the benefits of this fundamental exercise.

Rule of thumb: change your shoes every 500 miles of running. Flattened jogging shoes is another way to hurt your arches and ankles.

Second is SLEEP. If you are running you have to get your sleep. You can’t skimp on that. If you do, you may open yourself up for joint and cartilage injuries. I have no idea why but every time I try to run without enough sleep I get severe ankle and knee pains that take days to disappear.

Third is MODERATION. When I get into a regular schedule of running (say, 12 miles a week), the devil in me starts whispering into my ear: “Now that you can run this many miles, how about going a little FASTER? Surely you can go faster and impress whomever you’d like to impress, can’t you?”

Watch out for that voice because you can easily hurt yourself while trying to go faster.

If you’ve never run before, see your doctor first to make sure you do not have a medical condition that might be exacerbated by running.

If your doctor says “yes,” get out and run. You might find out it’s the best way to lose some weight and keep it off, as long as the Engine That Could keeps eating up those hills.

1) NETFLIX

Two words: “Forget it!”

I know how hyped up an operation Netflix is. I forgot the number of times I had to close a Netflix under-pop ad when I visit a web site. It’s been advertised and marketed like crazy. But I really think it sucks for a reason that IMHO borders on “consumer abuse” and “misrepresentation.”

Netflix promises “unlimited rentals” for the subscription category you sign up for, right? Well, think again...

If you rent just 2 movies a month, it’s fine. Netflix works just like promised.

But if you watch 15 movies a month like me, then Netflix becomes a nightmare.

The first month everything’s cool. Your DVDs arrive regularly, without pain.

But once the Netflix computer realizes that you are a high-volume customer, the shipments mysteriously slooow down to a CRAWL… for no good reason whatsoever. So much for "unlimited" rentals.

And I'm not the first one who discovered this either. I wish I could claim credit for that. The Internet is full of sites devoted to Netflix’s poor customer service and maddening “auto slow down” policy. Here are two:

http://netflixunderground.blogspot.com/2005/03/netflix-tactics.html

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/entertainment/netflix_quality.html

Rule of thumb is this: if your cost to Netflix as a customer falls below $2 per rental, then the Central Netflix Uber-Matrix starts to punish you by sitting on your DVDs.

It’s just bad business. I’m surprised Netflix is still allowed to operate in this country despite numerous complaints by countless customers. I strongly advise you against it if you are a movie fan (nut?) like me.

2) BLOCK BUSTER http://www.blockbuster.com/

This is my preferred service and I recommend it to anyone, eyes closed.

For one thing, BB never ever slows down your deliveries, no matter how many DVDs you rent a month. This is how it works:

Day 1: You mail in your returned DVD.

Day 2: BB acknowledges receipt and mails you the next DVD in queue.

Day 3: You receive your new DVD. Period.

BB mails DVDs even on a Saturday, which I really appreciate.

Second: BB’s selection is as good as Netflix’s, if not better. I do not remember a single DVD that I found in Netflix but was not available in Block Buster.

Third: thanks to BB’s brick-and-mortar stores, when you return your DVD to a BB store near you, you get a FREE replacement. How cool is that? So, if you watch 10 DVDs a month, you can also get 10 free replacements from BB if you visit the store.

Fourth: For certain subscription categories, BB also gives coupon for an ADDITIONAL free DVD per month.

One thing you must watch for is BB's ever-changing pricing policy.

When I first signed up with BB years ago, I used to pay $47 for 8-at-a-time unlimited rentals.

Then they chopped it down first to 5-at-a-time; then to 4.

Now, BB allows you to rent only 3 DVDs at-a-time, which might again change in the future.

I’m currently signed up for 3-at-a-time delivery (no in-store free exchange) option which costs me something like $15 a month. Not bad at all.

3) RED BOX
http://www.redbox.com/

This is a new and acquired taste for me and I’m very pleased with it.

I’m not sure if you have this service available where you live, but where I do, you can’t miss these big red boxes standing in a corner at McDonald’s restaurants and selected supermarkets.

Red Box is a fully automated self-vending system. You make your selection on screen, swipe your credit card, get your DVD and go home happy.

Cost? Just $1 a day. No subscription is required. It’s great.

This is how use Red Box: there are quite a few new release DVDs that are not immediately available from BB. Guess what? Red Box usually has those new titles.

So, while waiting for my next BB envelope to arrive, I rent a new release from Red Box.

Since the McDonald’s or the supermarket I rent it from are the places I visit frequently, it doesn't require a special trip either. It’s a convenient and efficient way to rent DVDs.

Last week one of the Red Box DVDs turned out to be unwatchable. It kept freezing up on me.

I called the company’s 800 number late at night and a very polite woman told me how to return the DVD the next day. She also sent me by e-mail special rental codes for TWO free rentals. I’m a happy puppy.

Red Box complements my main Block Buster option nicely. It does not have any of my favorite titles (old film noirs, French thrillers, Italian classics, Polish and Iranian dramas, John Ford westerns, etc.). But then that’s why I keep my BB subscription anyways.

The BB+RB arrangement works well for me. Both services cost me a total of $20-$25 a month and allow me to enjoy an average of 15 titles, about 4 of which are brand new releases.

4) CINEQUEST ONLINE http://www.cinequestonline.org/index.php

This is a classy online rental operation with headquarters in San Francisco.

Its collection is truly a cinema lover’s delight. I strongly urge you to go check some of their titles.

It is especially strong in animation, Indy, and Japanese/Asian titles. They even have a 3 Free Rental offer for newcomers.

I used to be a Cinequest member but I’m not anymore for a very simple reason: I live on the East Coast and CQ is in SF. It takes a whole week for me to send a DVD and get a replacement.

It just is not feasible or economical for me to wait that long for a single title.

But if you live in CA or close to SF, you might definitely want to give CQ a shot. It's an operation run not by a faceless corporate bureaucracy (like Netflix) but real people like you who are in love with the art of moving images.

Lions for Lambs fails on both levels. It’s neither one nor the other. It lectures through drama, but without teaching anything new.

Despite strong writing, directing and brilliant acting, it maintains a split-personality. It’s a film about war on terror that might have served its purpose better if delivered as a Political Science paper or a New York Times Magazine cover story.

But the thing is, that Poli-Sci paper or NYT article has been done already, more than once. We already know every single argument pushed forward in this film directed by Robert Redford and written by Matthew Michael Carnahan.

Thus not only its endless talking-heads sequences violate the main tenets of telling a story through “motion pictures,” but it also fails to enrich our understanding of the national predicament by saying something that we have not heard before.

Here is the “main message”: poor kids with superior ethics go and die in the hell of Iraq and Afghanistan fighting for us while rich kids kick back, enjoy themselves to death with all kinds of silly diversions on college campuses and thus become complicit in the national tragedy. Why? Because they choose the easy path out and eschew their responsibilities to become more engaged in the national political process.

Please tell me you haven’t heard that one before!

The film is structured as three parallel exchanges (technically, “sequences”) taking place simultaneously in real time but in totally different contexts, all tied to one another within the general context of war in Afghanistan.

Exchange 1: Veteran journalist Janine Roth (played by Meryl Streep The Divine) is invited to the young and upcoming Republican Senator Jasper Irving’s office (played by a sharp-as-ever Tom Cruise) for an official leak on the latest and baddest military campaign about to be unleashed in the mountains of Afghanistan.

Exchange 2: Professor Stephen Malley (brought to life by Robert Redford who is aging better than any French wine) is fencing ideas in his office with, Todd Hayes (Andrew Garfield), one of the smartest students that ever passed from his lecture hall. Malley is trying to shake Hayes out of his complacency. Hayes returns the favor by reminding the professor the hypocrisy of it all.

Exchange 3: A night-time U.S. Special Forces ambush on a godforsaken mountain top in Afghanistan. The squad carried by a transport chopper comes under heavy fire (thanks to faulty military intelligence). While they try to evade enemy fire, private Ernest Rodriguez (Michael Peña) falls off the chopper. And incredibly, his buddy Lt. Arian Finch (Derek Luke) dives after him WITHOUT a parachute! Incredible as it may seem, both survive the fall and live to fight the Taliban forces closing in on them.

Background: both Ernest and Arian were in Prof. Malley’s poli-sci class. While the rest of their classmates were thinking to advance their careers and make a lot of money, the two buddies shocked both their friends and Prof. Malley by signing up with the Army in order to do the “right thing.”

The irony of it all is that Redford also makes it clear that Arian and Ernest’s sacrifice does not change a darn thing back in Washington. There, in the capital of the nation, politics and journalism business continue to prosper as usual.

The film ends with the same split personality that it starts. At the end we still have not learned a new way to approach the deadlock and solve it. We are also not even sure if any effort is worth it to begin with.

Lions for Lambs makes sense only as an artistic witness to a depressing time in history when America did not know how to back out of a controversial war in which crucial mistakes were made by more than one parties involved.

But it's not luck really. The truth is much more simple and obvious: I write only what I feel strongly about.

Sometimes I puzzle people with 800 words about a movie shot back in 1956 or 1934. Why? Because I happen to love that film with a passion, regardless of when it was shot.

If, by contrast, I try to write about anything that does not really move me, then I'm “blocked” too because then I'd be just pretending. And when I pretend, I can't write.

I usually write easy because I choose topics that carry me a hundred miles a minute.

Sometimes it's politics. Sometimes it's a building. And many times it's a work of art or a thing of beauty.

But I start with emotions, always. And then shape it up with what I know.

At one point I of course re-write and edit. But reason and analysis usually come afterwards.

When you write from that deep core of adrenaline, enthusiasm, or “shakti,” you are never tongue tied. You never have a “writer's block.” The spirit in the air just takes over.

My opinion is, people have a “block” only when they try to write about things that really don't move them at all.

Some writers try to be respectable above anything else. Or they perhaps just try to make a few bucks to pay the bills. I understand that because I've been there. Quite a few times.

But when that's the case, there's no adoration, no infatuation, no bells ringing. The words just don't float to the surface like lilies.

If you dip your keyboard into that pool of passion within, then not writing, but STOPPING is usually the problem.

Here is the proof.

Imagine something that you HATE with a passion.

Start by filling up the blanks: “I hate ... because ...”

See how quickly you wrote that sentence? You already have a sentence in the bag! Just like that.

Then you may want to give a whole LIST of reasons why you hate X.

Next, you may dial up the things that you never forgot: “I never forgot the day when...”

The house burned down? Papa left you? Won the lottery? The first time you made love? Found that puppy by the side of the road on a rainy day? Received that letter announcing... (fill the blank)? Ran into your lost ... (fill the blank) while waiting at the airport?

Right there it's another quick and easy list.

You can try the same with the things that you love; drive you crazy; disappoint you; things that you are jealous of; things that you dream about day and night; or the people that broke your heart...

Make a list, cry your brains out, and suddenly you have sentences piling up out of nowhere. Feels like Heaven.

Granted, not all that writing will get you a Pulitzer or Nobel prize.

But my whole point is, when you (to use a wonderful metaphor that belongs to writing guru Natalie Goldberg) “open a vein” and then start to write, words and sentences flow like liquid lightning. All of a sudden you are flying in orbit without leaving your chair.

Start with your own emotional truth and the rest will follow (actually, chase you) like prairie fire.

Recommended reading: Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg.

Here are some my favorite American journalists who rarely fail to amaze me with their wit and erudition, powerful prose, and clarity of thought.

Peggy Noonan

She writes for the Wall Street Journal. Her Friday columns is a must reading for me. She used to be Ronald Reagan’s speechwriter. A devout Catholic and a committed Republican that I trust, despite the fact that I’m neither.

Her recent comments on Hillary Clinton’s turbulent candidacy should be enough to give you a sense of her depth and brilliance as a political commentator:

“She'll need more than four years to shake off the impression she made in 2008. And this is how you'll know she's making another bid for the presidency. She will wear skirts. Gone will be the pantsuits that made her look like a small blond man with breasts. It's the new me, I wear skirts! Her first impulse is to think cosmetically. A long and weary life in politics has left her thinking this is the way to think.”

Rex Reed

Friends, Rex Reed can write movie reviews like nobody's business. His New York Observer columns are honest and generous in dishing out both praise and punishment.

If you are in the receiving end of his accolades, you don’t need to die to go to Heaven.

Just makes sure you don’t get caught behind that red cape of excuses as his thousand pounds of linguistic fury is launched against your latest movie fiasco or acting shame.

REED HEAVEN: “Without a stick of makeup, in off-the-rack clothes and hair that needs a steam iron, Halle Berry is still the epitome of beauty and grace. But it is Benicio Del Toro who shocks and enthralls. This character actor with pasty skin, bags under the eyes the size of teacups, and a face like a map of the San Jacinto Valley is always deeply committed, astonishing to look at and full of surprises, but in Things We Lost in the Fire he is a total revelation.”

REED HELL: “Everything seems designed to please and fascinate 10-to-12-year-old girls without encouraging stress or premature hormones, and I see no reason why this harmless trend should end now. But nothing I have come across even begins to sink to the amateurish, rock-bottom, brain-dead bilge Warners has dusted off in the corny, boring and sleep-inducing 2007-style escapades of Nancy Drew redux, called, unimaginatively enough, Nancy Drew. I know this junk is marketed for pulsating pubescents, but why? That’s the only mystery in it worth solving.” [Review of Nancy Drew]

Warren Brown

Warren Brown is proof positive that you can write about ANYTHING you want and can still bring beauty and grace to our lives IF, that is, you actually know how to write well.

Mr. Brown continues to brighten my days with his Washington Post automobile reviews; not that I’m a car nut. Far from it.

But I can’t help enjoying the obvious affection with which he approaches all devices reaching a hundred miles on four wheels, and the social and cultural layers with which he qualifies his reviews. He is a master wordsmith at work, worth emulating.

A sample:

[Describing the control buttons on a BMW 325Ci]: “The entire choreography -- for it is nothing short of that -- takes place in less than 60 seconds. It is technology as haiku, drudgery transformed into ballet.”

Continues: “The 325Ci thus is the perfect guilt-free car for enjoying and living contradictions -- pursuing clear skies and fresh air in a gasoline-powered chariot, enjoying the open spaces paved with concrete and asphalt, and obeying posted speed limits in a car, even with its smallish 184-horsepower engine, designed to shatter them in seconds.

Life is good.”

Frank Deford

My favorite sports writer, hailing from Sports Illustrated and NPR every week.

Usually Deford is so right, so to the point, that I end up wondering how come I couldn’t think of such an “obvious” point myself, on my own.

If clarity of thought was his only strength, Deford could’ve been a mathematician too. But the man has his artistic side as well, as evidenced by his many best-seller novels.

Deford is one of my favorite writers for generating prose like the following:

[About Beijing Olympics]: “The reflected heat from the torch uproar will also help expose what a humbug the International Olympic Committee can be. This is the organization that loves to call itself a "movement." Come on, would we accept it at face value if Commissioner Bud Selig stood up and crowed about the "Major League Baseball Movement"? Would we bow our heads if Mayor Oscar Goodman asked us to pay homage to the "Las Vegas Strip Movement"? Get serious.”

[On Mixed Martial Arts]: “Boxing is the only major sport where the object is to hurt your opponent. Surely there can be no place for such an exercise in a more enlightened 21st century. But what has happened? Boxing has indeed lost favor, not because it's too violent for the modern civilized world, but because it's not violent enough.

Boxing is being superseded by what is called the mixed martial arts — emphasis on martial — which apparently is especially attractive because it's like a video game, only featuring flesh-and-blood human beings. Emphasis on blood.”

Have you heard about the Justine Larbalestier Survey?

Justine Larbalestier, a novelist from Down Under, conducted his own informal survey and asked his 18 "fellow Aussies, folks from the UK, Canada and the US" how much they got for their first novel. Seven of those who responded are full-time writers.

Here are the results:

1962: $1,000

1965: $3,000

1970: $10,000

1976: $700

1982: $7,500

1984: $7,500

1985: $2,500, $8,000

1989: $3,000

1990: $15,000

1995: $4,000

1996: $4,000

1997: $7,500

1999: $2,500

2002: $6,500

2003: $13,500

2004: $350, $10,000

Average advance: $5,920

Note that a writer in 2004 earned the same amount of advance as he did back in 1970 ($10,000) !

Adjust that by inflation, and you'll realize the dire odds most novelists are battling against. Despite a handful of stellar novelists who make big bucks, overall, novel writing is a sure way to the poor house.

Here is Larbalestier's advice for those who are thinking to become novelists:

"So my sage pieces of advice to someone contemplating a career as a novelist who begins by trying to find out what the average advance is? First I'd like to congratulate you—if you're in this game for the money it's a good idea to find out as quick as you can that there's not a whole lot to be made writing novels. Find another way to make dosh. Personally I'd recommend plumbing."

You can read the full details of his revealing and candid report by clicking here.

*** Discussion Thread

To read more about the financial "bread crumbs" with which an average novelist needs to make her peace, please read this discussion thread.

*** BOTTOM LINE

If you are an unknown fiction writer like me, your chances of both getting published through traditional publishers AND making money at the same time is not that good.

From the time you start shopping around for a traditional literary agent to when you see your book in the bookstores it will be an average of TWO years. Think about that...

Keep writing your novel but try such non-traditional channels of marketing as self-publishing and print-on-demand solutions like Lulu.com or Amazon's BookSurge.

There are quite a few literary agents and traditional editors trolling such sites to discover new talent that did not cost them a penny. So if you're good, trust me, the world will be happy to beat a path to your door.

Write well and from the heart, frequently.

Get them printed whenever you can.

And let your readers and the market place separate the wheat from the chaff, not the top-heavy bloated publishing dinosaurs of yesteryear. Whether you're going to sink or swim, let it be on your own terms and not on somebody else's.

I’m a sucker for NYC photo blogs (PBs) because I love the Big Apple but I never had the chance to live there on a long-term basis.

So NYC photo blogs are how I try to get my regular fix of things-New-Yoark.

With every photo I remember once again how much I love this sultry, chaotic, and majestic Mother of All Cities.

Here is a short list of my top favorite NYC PBs, plus another which has nothing to do with NYC but one you should really support by visiting.

1) Lightning Field

The granddaddy of all NYC PBs as far as I’m concerned. I have no idea for how long David F. Gallagher is keeping up this site. He is a freelance journalist who is published in some serious outlets including New York Times.

From time to time he takes us to different parts of the world but he is mainly a New Yorker. Follow him and he’ll take you to the corners of NYC that you never knew existed.

2) Quarlo

Owned by Todd Gross. This blog unfortunately stopped back in December 2006. But his archive is still amazing.

Probably the most self-aware stylist of them all, Quarlo managed to come up with the exact burnt color-palette with stinging greens and harsh yellows that to me conveys the daily struggle of life in NYC. Yet a lot of his photos reflects his own sense of visual humor as well.

I’ve sent him an e-mail to see what’s going on with the site but he didn’t answer. Worth a bookmark.

3) Satan’s Laundromat

A unique photo site specializing in the signs, graffiti and symbolic oddities of NYC. Also stopped in December 2006, unfortunately.

Most of these blogs are works of love and hard to keep them up when nobody’s paying you for your time, equipment and the overhead. You start with a camera and start roaming the streets like a drunk person; an artist drunk with the lust of life. Then, eventually, "life intervenes" and you find yourself a day-job with a steady paycheck, I guess... Goodbye camera.

4) Slower

Another once-great PB that is now over. By Eliot Shepard.

You can however now enjoy Shepard’s photos over at http://eliotshepard.com/ Check out his HORIZONTAL scrolling photo-bar. Fancy, eh?

5) Blue Jake

Still going strong, thanks god. A rich collection of amazing snapshots from Brooklyn, and other fine boroughs of New York.

6) Laura Holder

Gone! What a pity. It’s a silly directory now… What a waste of cyber space... There should be a law against such jarring domain transformations.

7) Joe’s NYC

Still fresh and live. Go Joe!

Mecca Pixel

What? Now it's a laptop computer store ??!! Sad and outrageous. It used to be a great photo blog.

9) NYC Photobloggers

A mega directory of all NYC photo bloggers. If there is anyone taking pictures of NY for over a year he or she is probably listed here.

10) Overshadowed

For those who like their photos large, unadorned, with no text. A site for the visual purists. A museum of fine arts, of sorts.

11) Rion

By Rion Nakaya. The only web site I know with a NU domain extension.

She is reporting from Paris for the last 2 years but gave us great panoramas of NYC in the past.

12) Infrangible

by Khoi Uong. Yes. Laudable.

Plus this:

13) Ziboy

A distinguished Chinese photo blog by Wen Ling. He is a guy who lives with his finger glued to the shutter release button of his digital.

I’ve seen photos on this blog over the last couple of years that made me wonder how the “Chinese authorities” allowed this blog to continue since Ling never hid his identity.

An honest photo appraisal of daily life in China (I think). Recently he published tons of photos from his USA visit (including NYC) but most of his archive is still about China.

Let's continue our empirical investigation into novelists' income with the League of Utah Writers (LUW) 2004 Survey.

The results of a survey that the League of Utah Writers conducted in 2004 with 234 writers re-confirm the plight of non-technical writers.

The survey found that the average income received from writing over 12 months for all writer members was a pitiful $2,705.

The writers who participated in the survey wrote in the following genres: Magazine and newspaper articles (33%), Editing and consulting (11%), Novels and books (32%), Short stories (6%), and Other (18%).

"The average income from writing received over the past 12 months for all writer members who actually reported any writing-related income [is] $5,213.28 ," LUW reported.

So how can a writer write full-time when she earns such an unrealistically low income?

The answer is – she doesn't.

Only 5.24% reported writing as their "main source of income."

44.1 % said writing was their "hobby." No wonder.

And 14.41% said writing "supplemented" their main income derived from another source.

Even those who said writing was their main source of income reported earning only $29,291 a year.

In 2004, the median household income in Utah was $45,726 – a figure above the national average of $41,994.

This means that, even by local standards, full-time authors made 36% less than what an average Utah resident made that year.

Those LUW members who said they wrote to "supplement" their main income reported earning $4,831 a year, or 89% lower than average Utah income.

The "hobbyists" reported earning $351 a year (99% lower).

*** Author's Guild (AG) Survey

Science Fiction author Tara K. Harper, reporting on the Internet about the results of an Author's Guild survey, does not mince her words: "A novelist generally is writing on spec. A first time novelist may actually wind up owing money to their publisher if sales are not sufficient."

What a frustrating and sad realization it must be to work day and night for years to write and publish a novel only to find that YOU owe the publisher money, and not the other way around!?

Harper reports that, according to the AG study she mentions, "the average author earns about $10,000 a year."

"However, because author incomes vary so wildly, you'll get a better picture if you look at averages within categories. From the various stats I've seen, a beginning, low-end, or one-off (one or two books only) author makes $4k to $10k a year -- before taxes, before agent commissions, and before the costs of doing business."

"Experienced, well-established midlist authors who write a book only once every year or two seem to fall into the $20k to $40k a year range -- again, before taxes, agent commissions, and the costs of doing business. For prolific authors who publish several books a year, and who have been publishing for 15 years or more, the gross income is closer to $60k to $100k."

We'll continue...

Mad-dog prospectors lusting after silver, oil and power; taking life-and-death chances with their bodies, minds, and souls…

Equally dogged preachers, freewheeling rascals and speculators of every kind roaming them arid hills burning with hope.

Winning some. Losing some. Fast forward a hundred years: welcome to California!

There Will Be Blood trolls a similar territory painted by a gentler brush in the Triple-Oscar-winner classic Elmer Gantry (1960) by Richard Brooks, featuring Burt Lancaster and Jean Simmons.

Is it a coincidence that both movies were adapted from Sinclair Lewis’s novels? I think not.

If this Double-Oscar winner were a vehicle it would be a 53 footer tractor trailer barreling down the highway of history, flattening quite a few “national creation myths” on its path.

Daniel Day Lewis’s Oscar-winning maniacal performance as Daniel Plainview raises both the art of acting and our understanding of America’s past to a new orbit.

The film is remarkable for two technical details as well:

1) This is the only film I’ve seen where there is no dialog during the first 14 minutes and 45 seconds.

It’s a remarkable feat to carry a major movie that long with only images.

Compare with two other great films of 2007, Michael Clayton and No Country For Old Men, which start off with long scenes of voice-over exposition.

2) This film, just like a part of its 2007 competitor No Country For Old Men, was also shot in Marfa, Texas.

Actually I heard that the sets of the two films were very close to one another; practically over the opposite sides of the same hill range.

At some point (I think it was the oil rig fire scene), there was so much smoke over the horizon drifting in from the TWBB set that the NCFOM crew had to postpone shooting to the next day.

But it’s not over. Another Hollywood classic was also shot in Marfa, Texas – Giant (1956), a George Stevens film featuring Rock Hudson, Elizabeth Taylor, and James Dean. (Incidentally, in that film Dean again played an oil prospector who got rich but then destroyed himself.)

These three films got nominated for a total of 25 Oscars [9 (Giant) + 8 (Blood) + 8 (No Country)] and ended up winning 7 [1 (Giant) + 2 (Blood) + 4 (No Country)] .

Not bad for a little town in West Texas, is it?

(WARNING: plot points revealed)

In a nutshell: Daniel Plainview, a nobody from nowhere, claws his way to oil riches around 1900s by using his ruthless determination to succeed.

In the process he uses an adopted boy as his son, to ingratiate himself to the locals as a “family man” and buy their land for as cheap a price as possible.

But Plainview is not the only jackal in town. The budding preacher Eli Sunday (played with a mesmerizing presence by Paul Dano of Little Miss Sunshine) is the chief obstacle between him and his unquestioned dominance.

Preacher Sunday also knows the real score and tries to shake down Plainview in more ways than one.

In the last horrifying scene Plainview proves that preacher Sunday is not his equal when it comes to a Pyrrhic victory which destroys the winner as well.

Writer-Director Paul Thomas Anderson has created a masterpiece that will endure the test of time. One of the best films I’ve seen in a long while.

Novelists are among the worst paid writers.

Yes, the Steven Kings, Dan Browns, and JK Rowlings of this world get paid extremely well.

Actually, Rowling is said to be on her way up to become the first writer in human history poised to earn $1 billion over her career.

But the average novelist is practically hungry and driving that same old rust-bucket god knows since when.

It takes years to write a decent novel.

Then it takes equally long to find an agent.

And when years later, the book finally gets published, the advance is usually around $5,000.

That's all most novelists will ever see since royalties are not guaranteed. And even when they earn any royalties, the checks take months or sometimes even a whole year to arrive.

*** Sad and Astonishing but True

Since the federal minimum wage in the United States as of July 24, 2007 is $5.85 an hour, translating to $11,700 a year, most novelists and story writers would make more money if they worked full-time at McDonald's. And let me prove that to you...

*** Bucknell Survey

Author Tobias Bucknell (Source: http://www.tobiasbuckell.com ) conducted a survey of 108 fantasy and science-fiction novelists.

His finding: "the median First Novel Advance for a novelist is $5,000. The number is the same for both hardcover and soft cover releases."

If you do have an agent, the advance goes up to $6,000. For those without an agent, it drops to $3,500.

Since on the average it takes at least two years to write and publish a novel, a writer on the average makes a whopping $2,500 a year per novel!

Considering the immense talent, knowledge and creativity it takes to write a novel, it's a miracle that anybody actually takes the time to write one.

If a novelist has a couple of novels under her belt, then the median advance goes up to $12,500 for those who have an agent. If they don't, the advance shrinks to $7,500.

So how many novels an author needs to write a year, every year, to pay her bills, buy a home, send her kids to college, and save for her retirement, etc.?

I'll leave the answer of that depressing question to you.

The wounds are still open. Our nerve-ends are still bleeding.

Watching In The Valley of Elah within such a historic context is not possible without going through a range of burning emotions.

This Paul Haggis (of Crash) written and directed work is a downer for sure. I can't see how one can watch this movie and feel good about ANYTHING. Period. It should've been rated triple-X if the idea is to save our kids from a mental breakdown.

(Warning: plot points revealed.)

Let me start off by commenting on Tommy Lee Jones who plays the lead character Hank Deerfield, a retired military police and a father who loses his son not on the battlefield in Iraq but to a senseless murder committed by his very own army buddies back at home base.

Ladies and gentlemen -- TLJ is an American institution. His craggy tired face, like perhaps that of Clint Eastwood, has turned into an American Monument and a cultural icon.

In a lot of scenes he does not even need to say anything. He just needs to present his face to the camera at a certain angle and look in a certain way, and wham! It's all there.

Susan Sarandon as his wife and Charlize Theron as Det. Emily Sanders also shine bright. We are in the presence of some world-class talent here.

Yet it's hard to find a single character in this whole production, with the exception of Det. Sanders, whom we can root for.

The plot points themselves pile up on us like hot heavy granite blocks. You get crushed with the unrelenting weight of one hopeless development after another.

Misogynist male cops making ruthless fun of a young female detective…

Young soldiers butchering and burning their buddy for no apparent reason at all (chalked up to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder – PSTD)…

Civilian and military investigators botching up the investigation every step of the way…

Sadistic US infantrymen torturing wounded "hadjis" in Iraq…

An immigrant custodian at a local high school who does not know which end of the American flag should be up on a flag pole…

Take your pick.

I have to admit I could not hold back my tears at the end of the movie not only because of the Deerfield couple's pain but also due to the way Hank Deerfield gives up on America and hoists the Old Glory upside down on the same high school flag pole, with his own hands.

That was a devastating scene. Hard to swallow.

I'm aware that the script is based on a true story (of late Specialist Richard R. Davis) but still you end up wondering: what have we got left if we "give up on America"?

Who can afford to do that? Is artistic license good enough an excuse or incentive to conclude a film on such a note?

Which brings me to a closely related issue – the way most Iraq War related films are bombing at the box office.

I think the American public are sick and tired of seeing one Iraq movie after another in which the servicemen and women are nothing more than sadistic losers who come back home as psychotic killers.

The American movie fans cannot believe that the glass is empty all the way down to the bottom, as frequently depicted in these movies.

We are still yet to see a more balanced crop of war movies in which the glass is half full.

But then perhaps that's a long order with a war like this which was launched on wrong intelligence and false premises.