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Feb 2, 2022Liked by Patrick E McLean

"Don't waste your time, or time will waste you." Knights of Cydonia, by Muse. Great song and video, but I still waste my time. I'm not afraid of being wasted. Hm, that is also slang for being drunk, isn't it? Never been that.

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It’s good to have a reminder that things will be okay and we shouldn’t give up. Sometimes, life gets so exhausting that doing nothing doesn’t feel like a choice at all, it feels like it’s the only thing you can do. But that isn’t true. “Be brave, good luck and don't give up hope at the beginning of the third act”. We just need to keep being brave.

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Feb 14, 2022·edited Feb 14, 2022

Well said. Stories are so powerful. They are woven into our fabric. "...and don't give up hope at the end of the third act." Ha ha nice. I believe the thing that enabled me to finally write a novel worth publishing was to study story structure and make sure those main tent poles, like the "all is lost" moment near the end of the third act, were in my stories. Before they weren't and that's how I was able to see why one of my novels seemed to drag so much, I stayed in Act 1 for like 35-40% of the story instead of having the much needed break into act 2 where the world gets turned upside down and the orphan type character becomes a wanderer. Then halfway through a warrior, and finally a martyr in act 3, or the last 25%. I got that neat story breakdown from Lou Anders when he was a guest on the Writing Excuses podcast.

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