Goodreads asked Stephen T. Brophy:

What’s your advice for aspiring writers?

Stephen T. Brophy There's really only one answer for this, and it's painfully obvious: write. Write. Write. All the time. Always be writing. Whenever you have a spare minute. Don't waste time. And don't worry about loving what you put down on the first pass (though try not to love it too much, either). Just get stuff down on paper and see it through to completion. Mistakes can always be fixed. Lapses in judgment are only that if you neglect to fix them for publication. There has never been a better time to be writing genre fiction, as thanks to Amazon and many other services, you can do an end-run around traditional publishers and get your work out to an appreciative audience if you're willing to learn a few tricks of self-marketing. But you have to do the work first. And if you are going the non-traditional self-publishing route, you have to be merciless with your own work and you need outside eyes who know as much or more about grammar as they do story. All too often, I read self-published books, even stories I like very much, but I'm distracted by the number of typos and incidental mistakes that could have easily been caught with a ruthless copyediting pass. But to reiterate--write your ass off (and read your ass off, too) because that is the number one surefire way to find your voice and become a great writer.

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