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The new Times expose on Ukraine is shocking, horrifying, enraging. Everyone involved with this caper needs to be sent up the river
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💌: Sharing a bit of my heart today. Can we have a nonpolitical church in these times? How about a nonpartisan one? This letter is free for all to read.
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It’s a big day at The Free Press.
Tyler Cowen, Jed Rubenfeld, Matthew Continetti, Batya Ungar-Sargon become columnists. And Coleman Hughes brings his podcast to our shop.
How to Write Like a Hardboiled Detective (With a Jazz Twist)
I write fiction, too, so I wanted to research the rules of writing the hardboiled detective genre:
Cut the fluff.
Ditch the adjectives.
Short sentences. Sharp like a muted trumpet.
Metaphors that hit like a bassline in a smoky bar.
Every line must groove, or it gets the boot
Your detective doesn’t “walk down the street.”
He “moves like a blues riff—slow, steady, and full of trouble.”
Writing noir is like playing jazz.
Know the rules. Then break them.
But always—always—keep the rhythm.
Do you think your writing swings? or is it just noise?
Does this still work now?