Don’t be a hack

Many years ago I was at one of my first book signings, and an older writer showed up. He was charming and witty.  He handed me his business card, which said “freelance hack and literary mechanic.”

 

Hah hah.

 

He was dead of alcoholism within a year.

 

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Some years later, I pitched an idea to a television show, and was told that they couldn’t do my idea, because if they did, people would think their show “was about something”, when the truth was that they were in the business of putting o...