101 Reasons to Stop Writing

• In 1765, François Antoine, chief huntsman to King Louis XV of France, proved that fantasy is bullshit by slaying the Beast of Gévaudan, which turned out to be an ordinary wolf (albeit one that liked to eat people).
• In 1780, Benedict Arnold generously offered his own name as a new metaphor for treason and treachery in the emerging field of American literature, replacing the tired and overused Judas.
• In 1832, near-bankrupt Scottish author Sir Walter Scott stopped writing the hard way, leaving his creditors to grow fat on the continuing sales of Ivanhoe. Mark Twain blames him for starting the American Civil War (Really).
• In 1866, H.G. Wells was born. Author of The Time Machine and War of the Worlds, Wells is often referred to as the Father of Science Fiction, usually by people who don’t believe that Jules Verne is the Father. The paternity case is still pending (scientists are still searching for a DNA sample that isn’t infected by Hugo Gernsback).
• In 1897, a curmudgeonly old bastard wrote a piece of sentimental fluff, exhorting a naïve little girl not to listen to her bitchy spoilsport friends, and it goes on to be the most reprinted editorial in history, dashing the hopes of thousands of terrible journalists that they might get paid to write a piece of sentimental fluff each Christmas.
• In 1912, legendary animator Chuck Jones was born. You will never be this funny.
• In 1937, the prototype for a million shitty fantasy stories was first published. You will probably never be this good — if you are, good luck trying to differentiate yourself in a saturated marketplace.
• In 1945, uber-producer Jerry Bruckheimer was born. Without him, Nicholas Cage would still be a character actor, Michael Bay would still be directing commercials, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman would not have married, there would be no C.S.I. Think about that for a moment. (Also, Pearl Harbor would be remembered as a military disaster, and not a critical and box-office disaster as well.)
• In 1947, some hack writer called Stephen King was born. You may have heard of him. With his easygoing style, vast prolificacy and ludicrous success, he has inspired an entire generation of bad writers.
• In 1957, writer/director Ethan Coen was born. He’s written half of a bunch of good movies.
• In 1974, failed actress and talk show troll Jacqueline Susann stopped writing, the hard way. Her novel Valley of the Dolls sold over 30 million copies, making it second only to The Da Vinci Code as the best-selling awful book of all time.
• In 2000, Bryan Smith stopped driving, the hard way. The previous year, Smith accidentally struck and almost killed Stephen King. In one of those creepy coincidences that would have you calling Shenanigans if you read it in a novel, Smith died of an accidental overdose on King’s birthday. (If you’re not familiar with the details of King’s accident, you can read about it in King’s On Writing, or read a fictionalised version in King’s The Dark Tower, or watch a fictionalised version in King’s Kingdom Hospital.)

Apologies to my Australian readers. It was September 21 when I started writing this.