title: The Essential Guide for New Writers: From Idea to Finished Manuscript
author:  Valerie Storey 
description: "...designed to give the first-time writer confidence, encouragement, and practical knowledge..." -- <i>Writer's Digest Magazine, September, 1995</i><br /><br />"Information is easy to follow from getting your thoughts on paper, giving your characters life, building conflicts and creating solutions." -- <i>Gotta Write, Winter, 1995</i><br /><br />"The material is presented in a logical progression of ideas, checklists, and writing exercises." -- <i>The Prolific Freelancer, Vol. I, Issue 1, 1996</i>
zlib_text: THE MAZE
  
    
  
  by Catherine Counlter
  
    
  
  Copyright (c) 1997 by Catherine Coulter. ISBN: 0-515-12249-1
  
    
  
  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  
    
  
  WIHENEVER I HEAR WRITERS brag about how their editors don't require any
  changes to their manuscripts, I'm honestly floored. It's an editor's job to be
  the reader's representative and thus make the manuscript better. And believe
  me, a manuscript can always be made better.
  
    
  
  I've got to be the luckiest writer ever. I don't have just one editor, I have
  a three-person hack-and-maim team, and all three of them give me very timely
  feedback, all with an eye to making my novels the best they can be. My ongoing
  thanks to Stacy Creamer, Leslie Gelbman, and Phyllis Grann.
  
    
  
  I'd also like to thank my husband, Anton, for getting back into the editing
  saddle after a ten-year hiatus. He's the Editor from Hell (in the good sense).
  
    
  
  And finally, my continuing thanks to Karen Evans with the red Babylonian
  harlot hair. Without her incredible mental energy, enthusiasm, 