Shannon Turlington

The writer’s job is to entertain, but there is more. Writers can educate, enlighten, even corrupt. This is why books are often seen as dangerous.

Writers are observers. They want to figure out what makes us human. Why do we behave the way we do toward one another? What is our purpose here? Is there any meaning to all this? Are we in control of our destiny or at the mercy of fate, the environment, heredity or dumb luck?

Writers are always looking. They are constantly:

• looking back — to understand who we are by understanding where we came from
• looking around — at contemporary society, culture, institutions, values and beliefs
• looking inward — revealing interior thoughts and psychology, trying to figure out what makes us tick
• looking beyond — turning our fears into monsters; realizing our fantasies by making the impossible possible; traveling to the furthest reaches of space, other dimensions and parallel worlds
• looking forward — extrapolating on the problems of today and following them through to their ultimate ends