“IN MY OPINION (and this is based on my experience), having nothing you feel compelled to write about may make it harder to get started, but once the engine kicks in and the vehicle starts rolling, the writing is actually easier. This is because the flip side of having nothing you must write is being able to write freely about anything. Your material may be lightweight, but if you can grasp how to link the pieces together so that magic results, you can go on to write as many novels as you wish. You will be astounded how the mastery of that technique can lead to the creation of works with both weight and depth—as long as, that is, you retain a healthy amount of writerly ambition. In contrast, writers who from the first write about heavy topics may eventually—although, obviously, this does not occur in all cases—find themselves faltering under the very weight of that material. Writers who launch their careers writing about war, for example, can approach their subject matter from various angles in various works, but at a certain point they may, to some degree or other, find themselves backed into a corner when forced to think of what to write next.”