Writing best-practice: Read other writers’ obituaries

When a writer dies, read the obituary; it’s almost always worthwhile. For instance, from the New York Times obit of mystery writer Warren Murphy:

“Terror’s not ghosts flying through the walls, going woo-woo-woo,” Mary Higgins Clark, the mystery writer, quoted him as saying. “Terror is when the party is over and everyone has gone home and at last you can take a deep breath and you lock the doors and your place is finally empty and quiet, and you turn out the lights and then you hear the toilet flush upstairs. That’s terror."

And that’s good writing.