Of course, defining �successful�, or for that matter �excellence�, is very subjective. We hope you agree with our choices. More importantly, will you use what you discover here to prompt or to improve your own writing? Always presupposing you�re reading this book because you want to write, or write better, what�s been stopping you so far? What stops you now? What would have to happen for you to do it?

Asking yourself these questions, notice what happens inside your head�and THAT�S what is our main focus�what�s happening INSIDE the heads of the writers we admire. As nothing comes about without someone first thinking it, and as all thinking has structure, if we can unpack the structures used by those who do something well, then others can use these to improve how they do something.

Everything starts in the mind. And when we have an outcome, a goal, only seeing it as a future event will perhaps also conjure up a vision in our heads of a series of hurdles between now and that future we want.

However, if we are SOLUTION �based, we start by imagining we have already achieved our outcome�and then we can look back to see how we did it! If you tell your mind it has already done something it must come up with the �how�.

So�.imagine that you�ve now finished reading this book; and by using what you learned from it you�ve just completed your first piece of creative writing. See how good it looks on your writing pad or computer screen, hear the applause as you read it to your friends, feel the glow of satisfaction and achievement inside. Then look back to now, and the sense of eager anticipation you feel at this moment when you�re about to start the journey to then! Rightly, or should I say �Writely�, so! Because this is where the voyage of discovery begins.

And you will see that all you had to do first was to simply turn the page����!