What I want instead is to bring back the idea of writing as something that has a muscularity and a will to bring about a different world. And if we are to do that, we need to understand it as both work and labor, and not pretend that to ask for payment is to be ungrateful about our place as writers.
Excerpt: This is a murder mystery without a murder. Think of it like a Brian De Palma movie from the 1970s: a streetwalker is found dead in an alleyway, and the detective assigned to the case is about to write it up as another transaction gone awry until he begins to see the clues that unravel a sprawling political conspiracy.
The body is incidental.
