M.A. Fuentes asked Michael Grant:

I loved your Gone series, and since you're such a great writer I was wondering if you could help me with writing a book. My problem is that I only get a few chapters in until I want to write something else or just not write at all. So, do you have any advice? If so, thank you!

Michael Grant The grass is always greener in the other book. You start, you think, "hey this is going really well!" A few chapters later you realize no, this is going to be hard work. You think, "I'll write something different."

Rinse and repeat. And pretty soon you have three chapters of eight different books.

OK, first this happens to everyone, including me. Second, and lean real close so you can hear this. . . WRITING A BOOK IS NOT FUN, IT'S WORK.

Dude, everyone on planet earth wants to have written a book. Have written. Past tense. It's great fun to have written a book. It's probably great to have climbed Mount Everest, but the climbing part? That's really, really hard.

This is probably the biggest dividing line between those who succeed in writing and those who don't. People who wait to be inspired or only work when it's fun are called, 'amateurs.' People who power through are called, 'professionals.'

Work. I know that's probably not the answer you're looking for but that is the correct answer: work. Get up and work. Work when you feel like it, work when you don't feel like it; work when you think things are going well, work when things are going to hell. I didn't get to where I am because I'm the most talented or the nicest or the luckiest or the handsomest or the most-deserving. I'm none of those things. What I am is the guy who will out-work everyone else.

Everybody wants the prize, and you are competing with all those people, all those wanna-bes. So, assuming you have some talent (because you do need that) the next thing you need is. . . what's the word? Four letters: W-O-R-K.

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