The Wicked Ingénue

1. Write only what your instructor wants/likes to read. You can discern this by listening to her/his feeble compliments in workshop: “that was sort of well-done”; “this part was kind of okay”; “Well, I didn’t hate that character”, etc.

2. Treat yourself to a Kit-Kat bar before workshop starts. In China, it’s considered good luck to eat a Kit-Kat before an exam and/or an otherwise grueling day in class. Although there’s no scientific proof of mystical benefits, those little crunchy sticks sure do stimulate the ol’ endorphins.

3. Forget everything you’ve learned and/or think you know about writing. Whatever it is, it’s wrong. At least in this workshop.

4. Read the workshop instructor’s book and research everything else s/he has written so you can pull it out in class: “Well, Professor So-and-So, when I read your book about how to write fiction, you said . . . “. A rare smile and nod of approval will follow.

5. Don’t ever go to the instructor’s office hours and complain that s/he was “too hard” on your story. S/he’ll make an example of you and class, and you’ll never hear the end of it.

6. Avoid using clichés at all costs, even if you have to do ridiculous things like replacing “his heart soared” with “the most crucial organ in his body did a jumping jack between his lungs”.

7. Reconsider law school.

8. Hold your tongue (in this workshop, such a phrase would be replaced by something like, “restrain the big muscle in your mouth that allows you to taste the chocolatey goodness of a Kit-Kat bar”) when your instructor literally tears apart pages of your manuscript and says, “This scene is a bad example of an equally bad idea”.

9. Convince yourself every day that you suck at writing and should find another field to fall back on.

10. For God’s sakes, don’t cry. Never let ‘em see you sweat. Besides, it’ll all be over soon, anyway.