I just received an offer from a magazine editor who wants to print an article that was first published last year. Since it’s a reprint, what should I charge?
.

As much as you can OR as much as they’re willing to pay.

Sometimes, I’ve ended up earning more from a reprint than I did for the original piece. If you can, check out the pay rates of the magazine online or by asking their other writers and quote accordingly.

If you’re really stuck though, 50% of the original amount that you were paid would be fair.

I was asked recently to give advice to college students who are working towards a career in writing. I compiled a list of tips for them. I share them with you here.

1. Don’t chase the money, the power, or the fame. Chase the story. Find stories that speak to you, and go after them.

2. Trust your instinct. When things seem impossible, everything goes wrong, and you begin to question if you’ll ever make it, find the answers in your gut.

3. Don’t compete with others. Only be better today than you were yesterday.

4. Read. But read good books. Don’t fill your head with junk. Learn only from the best.

5. Resist temptations. Being in the media can give you power, it can also give you money, fame, and opportunity. Take the opportunity, but don’t get too attached to the rest. The lure of power can be great, but remember the Spiderman movie? “With great power comes great responsibility.” (And yes, you’ll get free parking everywhere. But no, you should not take advantage of it.)

6. Try not to mix your personal and professional life. If you have to, do so responsibly.

7. Know the rules. Practice them. And know when to break them.

8. Build a community outside of work. Life is beautiful. Explore. Take risks. See the world. Experience it. Take time off to enjoy life, and you’ll be a better writer for it.

Rating: ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼

Comments: Mesmerizing. I loved the ending– there is no happy ending, no sad ending. In life, there is no ending. The book is a fascinating story of friendship and betrayal, and how the past always seems to catch up with you.

I have to admit though: reading this book was very weird for me, because I once knew someone exactly like the narrator. I felt like I was reading about him. Eerie, but a testament to excellent characterization.

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From the Book:

That was a long time ago, but it’s wrong what they say about the past, I’ve learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way out.

***

A part of me was hoping someone would wake up and hear, so I wouldn’t have to live with this lie anymore. But no one woke up and in the silence that followed, I understood the nature of my new curse: I was going to get away with it.

***

He knew I had betrayed him and yet he was rescuing me once again, maybe for the last time. I loved him in that moment, loved him more than I’d ever loved anyone, and I wanted to tell them all that I was the snake in the grass, the monster in the lake. I wasn’t worthy of this sacrifice; I was a liar, a cheat, and a thief. And I would have told, except that a part of me was glad. Glad that this would all be over with soon. Baba would dismiss them, there would be some pain, but life would move on. I wanted that, to move on, to forget, to start with a clean slate. I wanted to be able to breathe again.

***

When you kill a man, you steal a life. You steal his wife’s right to a husband, rob his children of a father. When you tell a lie, you steal someone’s right to the truth. When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness. There is no act more wretched than stealing.

***

As it turned out, Baba and I were more alike than I’d ever known. We had both betrayed the people who would have given their lives for us.

***

Sometimes, I think everything he did, feeding the poor on the streets, building the orphanage, giving money to friends in need, it was all his way of redeeming himself. And that, I believe, is what true redemption is, Amir jan, when guilt leads to good.

***

I wondered if that was how forgiveness budded, not with the fanfare of epiphany, but with pain gathering its things, packing up, and slipping away unannounced in the middle of the night.

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