Personable and specific advice offering real help for writers struggling to find a practical path forward.
A self-help guide for aspiring writers navigating the reality of maintaining a full-time job.
Drawing from his own career as a software developer filled with “kick-me-when-I’m-down kind of day[s]”, the author here shows how creative ambitions can coexist with corporate realities. Each chapter follows a standard format, complete with summaries and takeaways, with DeVito frequently punctuating his points with humor (“Office Space, anyone?” he ruefully asks, wishing day jobs could be avoided altogether). The author focuses on pragmatism, reminding readers that the day job, which provides structure and money, is both the greatest obstacle to and a necessity for continuing their creative work. His thorough accounting of everything a writer working another gig needs to thrive ranges from micro-goals, such as writing for five minutes a day (“you will end up writing for more than five minutes,” he promises), to big-picture planning, to keeping the worlds of work and writing separate. DeVito aims to inspire readers by delving into his own story and those of numerous other writers who have defied the odds to get their work published, highlighting what is possible (“If you want it bad enough and for the right reasons, you cannot fail”). Though much of the advice here is standard fare for books on writing (including chapters encouraging writers to be patient and set goals), DeVito’s voice is that of a trusted confidant, offering not just one solution but many. The book truly shines in its specificity, especially in chapters about keeping writing separate from work obligations, navigating company policies, and hiring help (such as editors or ghostwriters). The author even addresses best practices for using AI. Budding writers will find the frank discussions of costs and resources very helpful if they feel lost, and the author’s bright optimism will leave them ready to tackle the true demands of balancing creative endeavors with a career.
Personable and specific advice offering real help for writers struggling to find a practical path forward.Pub Date: July 23, 2025
ISBN: 9798985445169
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Sept. 25, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
Sedaris at his darkest—and his best.
In which the veteran humorist enters middle age with fine snark but some trepidation as well.
Mortality is weighing on Sedaris (Theft by Finding: Diaries 1977-2002, 2017, etc.), much of it his own, professional narcissist that he is. Watching an elderly man have a bowel accident on a plane, he dreaded the day when he would be the target of teenagers’ jokes “as they raise their phones to take my picture from behind.” A skin tumor troubled him, but so did the doctor who told him he couldn’t keep it once it was removed. “But it’s my tumor,” he insisted. “I made it.” (Eventually, he found a semitrained doctor to remove and give him the lipoma, which he proceeded to feed to a turtle.) The deaths of others are much on the author’s mind as well: He contemplates the suicide of his sister Tiffany, his alcoholic mother’s death, and his cantankerous father’s erratic behavior. His contemplation of his mother’s drinking—and his family’s denial of it—makes for some of the most poignant writing in the book: The sound of her putting ice in a rocks glass increasingly sounded “like a trigger being cocked.” Despite the gloom, however, frivolity still abides in the Sedaris clan. His summer home on the Carolina coast, which he dubbed the Sea Section, overspills with irreverent bantering between him and his siblings as his long-suffering partner, Hugh, looks on. Sedaris hasn’t lost his capacity for bemused observations of the people he encounters. For example, cashiers who say “have a blessed day” make him feel “like you’ve been sprayed against your will with God cologne.” But bad news has sharpened the author’s humor, and this book is defined by a persistent, engaging bafflement over how seriously or unseriously to take life when it’s increasingly filled with Trump and funerals.
Sedaris at his darkest—and his best.Pub Date: May 29, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-316-39238-9
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2018
PROFILES
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