Goodreads asked Robert Ellis:

What’s your advice for aspiring writers?

Robert Ellis We spoke earlier about reading a novel more than once to see how the story works. But the truth is, the workings of a good novel are sometimes difficult to see. In a film, if the story isn't working, there's nothing an actor or director or cinematographer can do to make the movie a good movie. In a film, all we see is story. In a novel, the story could be off the mark and we might still call it a good read. Think of the complexity of the reading experience. First and foremost is the author's voice. It might be the thing we like most about the finished work. Maybe it is the story after all that grabs us, or the characters, or even the dialogue that draw us in. It could also be said that the reader brings so much to the process. I've always thought that it takes two people to make a good novel. The writer who thinks up the work and fleshes it out in words, and the reader who brings their imagination to the book, sees past the words and fills in all the blank spaces with detail. So my advice for aspiring writers (at least in the beginning) would be to study the books they love most, but also the films they love just as much. (Just one thing to keep in mind, the best writers these days are working on cable series, not theatrical motion pictures. Stories of length like that are not going to help you write a novel, so make sure your film picks stand out. Also, it could be said that Dashiell Hammett and Thomas Harris are two of the greatest novelists who ever lived. The reason I mention it is this. When their novels were made into films, their stories were so tight that they went straight from book to screen. If you pick up the screenplay for THE MALTESE FALCON, what you'll find is the novel -- word for word -- translated into screenplay form by the assistant to the director, John Huston. When I saw it, I had to catch my breath!)

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