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Some of you may remember a blog post in April responding to a question from Jason, an Iraq War veteran who was working on his descriptions. The post inspired a slew of articles on various aspects of description, which we'll be highlighting throughout the month of July.

We had a number of excellent responses to that blog post, many of which pointed to the fact that good descriptions are grounded in observation. So the first thing we must work on is honing our powers of observation. For tips and strategies, including those left by readers -- thanks to all of you -- click through the link above.

A playwright friend of mine recently had a breakout play after years of living on nothing (at one point he even moved back home with his mom). He didn't come from money or privilege, and his family was not supportive of his career (which, of course, made it that more humiliating to move back home). But in spite of all that, he always believed he was meant to be a writer and that eventually his work would be recognized: he never lost faith in himself or his work.

His recent success got me thinking about the different things that sustain writers during hard times. My friend found strength in meditation. Avi, who became a wildly successful children's/YA author despite having a learning disability, persevered because he believed he had stories worth telling -- and because he liked his writing, even when no one else did. Suzan-Lori Parks advises writers to "have faith in your personal effort or sweat. And faith in God, or whatever you want to call it. Then the voices will come.”

What sustains you during lean times? If you've ever been tempted to give up, what kept you going? What advice do you have for writers suffering from doubt?

So I have two questions in light of a recent Washington Post article. First, and most fun, what did fans think of the new Jodi Picoult movie, which took in $12 million over the weekend? Did the movie measure up to the book?

And second, as the article itself asks, why are her books so popular? Is it because they serve as "an inoculation against the far-fetched terrors of real life, or as emotional scenario-planning for the unbearable," or because "she is a permission slip for gut-wrenching emotion," or some other reason the article doesn't mention?

I discovered Wordle on a recent blog carnival: it generates word clouds, or collages, using text you enter. (The program chooses words based on frequency; the most frequently used words get the biggest font.) The blogger who theorized that writers could use it to discover themes in their work or note over-used adjectives. When I mentioned this to one of my more cynical friends, he scoffed, and then added, "But it does make a pretty picture." I think the truth is somewhere in between. I entered text from a story of mine and did find it interesting to see what portrait emerged of the story, in the way that having your fortune told is interesting. But you can judge for yourself, based on my collage of a chapter from a popular Jane Austen novel, or by heading over to the site yourself.