"The story is the horse, and the writer is the rider of the horse, and you as the editor, need to help guide them along. And if the rider starts to fall off, you put them back on, and it's your job to lead them safely into the barn. At no point should you shove the rider off the horse, get on yourself and ride it into the distance," says Amanda Heckert, executive editor of Garden & Gun.

Amanda Heckert is something of a wunderkind and an absolute boss of an editor.

In this episode we talk about:

• How she tells her writers to let it rip (within reason)
• How she found empathy for the writer side of the table, and how writers can better understand the POV of the editor side
• Writing a great pitch
• How a story is a horse the writer is the rider
• And the arc of her career that brought her back to her native South Carolina

You can learn more about Amanda at gardenandgun.com and follow her on IG @amandaheckert.

This episodes opens with an audio excerpt of The Front Runner, read by Roger Wayne.

Order The Front Runner

Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm

Welcome to Pitch Club

Show notes: brendanomeara.com

"If you don't cultivate other interests or travel or spend time with friends, this and that, you don't have anything to write about," says Dane Huckelbridge, author of Queen of All Mayhem (William Morrow).

Dane returns to the show to talk about his latest book, but also a smattering of other juicy writer topics such as:

• Procrastination
• Writing around the uncertainty
• Not having much of a routine
• Spacing out
• Niche hobbies
• And staying motivated

Dane can be found at danehuckelbridge.com and on IG @huckelbridge.

This episodes opens with an audio excerpt of The Front Runner, read by Roger Wayne.

Order The Front Runner

Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm

Welcome to Pitch Club

Show notes: brendanomeara.com

"One of the things I've done is to reconfigure the fireworks. The fireworks for me now are getting to have this thing off my desk so I get to work on something new. That's the firework," says Yi Shun Lai, an author, writer, and instructor.

Our occasion for this show was an essay she wrote for Writer Magazine about "arrival fallacy," this notion that once we get "there," wherever "there" is, we will have made it.

She's the author of three books, all in different genres, the YA novel A Suffragist's Guide to the Antarctic, the novel Not a Self-Help Book: The Misadventures of Marty Wu, and the micro memoir Pin Ups.

Learn more about Yi Shun at thegooddirt.org and follower her on social media @yishunlai.

In this episode, we talk about:

• How to reconfigure the fireworks
• Arrival fallacy
• Money
• Privilege
• And being kind to yourself.

Order The Front Runner

Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm

Welcome to Pitch Club

Show notes: brendanomeara.com