Goodreads asked Russell Burden:

What’s your advice for aspiring writers?

Russell Burden Well, they (who ever "they" are) say to write what you know when first starting out. I think there is a lot of merit to that because your first goal as a writer is to find your authentic voice. It is difficult when first writing to not mimic other writing styles. My first story was about a psychiatric hospital because that was an environment I knew well and could speak authoritatively on. The story is not very well written and it took me almost three months, but it did teach me how to write.

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