Ten minutes or more

I was listening to the Barnes and Noble Meet the Author's podcast today.  Authors from across the publishing landscape discuss their latest book and their life as an author.  Specifically, they speak about the books that influenced them as children and how they began their writing careers. 

Again and again, I listened to authors talk about how they quit their jobs, took sabbaticals, moved to England and otherwise devoted a year or more to their first novel, carving out huge swaths of their...