A Ten Dollar Investment: Million Dollar Productivity by Kevin J. Anderson

 

Spoiler alert: the trick to writing productivity is writing all the time. And you have a lot more time than you think. I promise.

Seriously.

I picked this gem of a book  (Million Dollar Productivity (The Million Dollar Writing Series)) up at Salt Lake Comic Con after a panel that included the author was asked a question along the lines of how they avoid writer’s block. Without missing a beat, one of the panelists (Larry Correia, I think) said there’s no such thing as writer’s block, and each of the panelists agreed. Now, I’ve never had a problem with writer’s block, per se, but there have been times when I’ve questioned my own ability to accomplish much writing.

Sure, I can bust out a 140 character long tweet without two brain cells, and I can click ‘like’ on about 19,000 Facebook posts of LOL Catz and cute little babies without losing a single calorie. But writing something substantive? A blog post? Finishing the fourteenth short story that I’ve begun this summer? Rounding out the outline of that space opera novel I’ve been working on since my first child was born (alright, it’s not the same novel anymore, but the point remains)?

Then it’s a bit more difficult.

Back to Salt Lake Comic Con and the author’s panel. The panel was a list of fairly illustrious–if also fairly local–authors, including the not unproductive Brandon Sanderson, Larry Correia, Dave Farland/Wolverton, and the currently being reviewed book’s author, Kevin J. Anderson. Somewhere in that discussion about writer’s block (which was not the panel topic, by the way), Anderson noted that a lot of times it was a productivity problem, not a lack of material to write about, and if you keep working, you manage to blow through the block. Coming from a guy who has busted out 125 novels–a number of which a bestsellers–and doesn’t look like he’s been parked on the couch consuming potato chips for the last five years, I was interested.

(Did you see the subtle way he plugged his book there? Yeah, me neither.)

So, naturally, I bought it as soon as the panel was over and I could make my way through the crowds over to Anderson’s Wordfire booth.

I read it that night. The book is short because, let’s be honest: you should spend more time writing than reading about how to spend more time writing.

I won’t give away the million dollar secrets here, because that’s how Anderson’s going to make his million dollars, but the $10 I dropped on the book was worth it, even if just to inspire me to change my habits and behavior to write more.

And I have: the last half week has been substantially more productive and useful than in a long while. Productivity is a fantastic thing; it builds on itself and creates more productivity and more success. That’s worth way more than $10.

Title: Million Dollar Productivity
Series: The Million Dollar Writing
Author: Kevin J. Anderson
Genre: Nonfiction
Publisher: WordFire Press
Release Date: August 11, 2014
Format: Paperback
Pages: 86 pages
Source: Salt Lake Comic Con

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