Oh, dear, how I hate the "how to be a writer" books. It's like, there are some basics you can teach, of course, some things that are universal, but for something like writing, what's the point in everyone writing the same? Not to mention that after a certain point when you are proficient enough in writing, you discover all those rules are there to be broken - it's always a question of knowing how to break them and why you break them, I think.

/tirade against "how to write" books.