In this episode of Striving Novelists Support Group, we discuss writing challenges, including the NYC Midnight Challenge. A significant portion of the conversation focuses on the impact of last lines in storytelling, emphasizing the need to trust the reader and the power of ambiguity in narratives. The discussion highlights the value of reading and analyzing short stories as a means to enhance one’s writing craft.
When I got my bachelor’s degree—decades ago, now—I started out in film school, with aspirations of making it big in the movies. However, over the course of four years, I ended up taking so many writing classes that I had to change my major to Media Communications, with a Scriptwriting emphasis, in order to graduate in my target year.
In the two decades since, I found myself drifting through several jobs that just paid bills. I have worked as a photographer, a truck driver, tour manager, and online marketing consultant. Finally, the most recent decade, I have settled for working as a software engineer. It pays well, and is something I am actually pretty good at. But I find myself longing to go back to the roots of what I really want to do—what my earlier college career should have told me I need to do—write.
In the two decades since, I found myself drifting through several jobs that just paid bills. I have worked as a photographer, a truck driver, tour manager, and online marketing consultant. Finally, the most recent decade, I have settled for working as a software engineer. It pays well, and is something I am actually pretty good at. But I find myself longing to go back to the roots of what I really want to do—what my earlier college career should have told me I need to do—write.
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