Trout was petrified there on Forty-second Street. I [the fictional author] had given [Trout] a life not worth living, but I had also given him an iron will to live. This was a common combination on the planet Earth.469 Consider slacking up on the iron will to write, if it gives you a life not worth living. Caught up in the writing life—and the idea of being “a writer”—the reasons you began writing in the first place may dim. Consider slacking up on that involvement, if that happens. Do something else that’s compelling to you.
