Temple of the Writing Gods

Outside, it's made of common architecture. It looks like any other structure, though perhaps more like a library than a government building.

The entrance is guarded by Self Doubt and Over Confidence, a bust on either side of the door flanked with columns. If you can get passed them, there is a whole world of iconography and imagination on the other side, treasures untold.


Along the main chamber is the Pantheon of Writing Gods:

• Show Don't Tell is an ever-shifting animated statue displaying hints of subtext and the deft hand of it's sculptor. It has no plaque.
• Writer's Conference is a labeled alcove with comfortable chairs, a bar, and a coffee stand. A pair of Writing priests sit on a never-ending panel.
• The Nine Genres (Literary, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Children's, Romance, Mystery, Western, Horror, Thriller) take an entire corner to themselves beyond an archway of their subgenre offspring (Young Adult, Steampunk, Magical Realism, Paranormal Romance, Space Opera, Speculative Fiction and other hybrids that do not yet have names or traction)
• The Chicago Manual of Style needs no introduction, but its plaque is very long and full of contradictions.
• Procrastination is difficult to pin down or escape, but if one turns back to the entrance they can usually find her there, chatting with Self Doubt and Over Confidence.
• The New Yorker leans down as a complicated bas relief from the ceiling. It sees all, knows all, and is very selective.
• Finally, at the very center of our great hall, is a massive statue of Stephen King. Below him run the Minor Pantheon he is often given credit for having given birth to: Read As Much As You Write, Only Use Said in Dialogue, Kill Adverbs, Kill Your Darlings, and Write Every Day.

Of course no great mythos would be complete without a number of demi-gods and niche idols, the trends of the writing life:

• Building a Platform always underconstructed, worshipped so that one can be published.
• Query Letters as the prophetic medium through which to contact the every elusive Agents.
• The 3 Interrupting Punctuations; Semi-Colon, Em-Dash, and Parenthesis (that often show up - where you least expect them).
• Strong Female Characters looking for a home.

And of course, we have a few of our many, many heroes: Tostoy, Hemmingway, Woolf, Morison, and Vonnegut.

Behind the temple, through some winding ways, one can find new additions, sub-temples to Self Publishing and the MFA.

Throughout everything wafts the great Incense of Imagination, enticing you deeper and away from the temple and to the altar. There awaits your computer or your typewrite or your notebook and pen. There you will sit and worship, tapping out one character at a time. It is only there, in a small space that none of the Gods can know, that you can write.