When I first decided to take up writ­ing as a seri­ous pur­suit, I fig­ured the best way to get started was to ask a writer for advice. My lucky break was that Connie Willis hap­pened to be in town to give a read­ing, and she gave me a won­der­ful tuto­r­ial in the basics; just Connie, her hus­band, and my wife, talk­ing for a cou­ple of hours in a Laramie book­store. I owe a lot to Connie’s early advice.