Time & Perspective Quote by Lynn Abbey

Self-deprecation is a craft move here, not just a mood. Lynn Abbey frames her own prose as foreign, then escalates the metaphor into an action sequence: “dodging bullets and gasping for breath.” The joke is that writing, which readers often imagine as quiet and controlled, is experienced by the writer as a high-stakes sprint through hostile terrain. It lands because the imagery is so bodily. “Second language” suggests distance from fluency, a sense of constant translation; “bullets” and “breath” turn that mental friction into physical danger.

The intent isn’t to beg for reassurance. It’s to puncture the myth of the effortless stylist and replace it with a more honest, working-writer ethos: sentences are built under pressure, not bestowed. Abbey also sneaks in a compliment to the reader. If her paragraphs feel like a firefight to compose, then the polished result is evidence of stamina and revision, not inspiration. The self-critique becomes a flex.

There’s subtext about the genre ecosystem Abbey comes from, too. As a prolific fantasy and media tie-in writer, she worked inside schedules and shared worlds where speed and deliverability matter. “By the time I get to the end of a paragraph” sounds like a writer racing deadlines, wrestling clarity out of chaos. It’s also a sly nod to how prose can betray its maker: on the page, you want authority; behind the page, you’re improvising, second-guessing, and trying to make language obey. Abbey’s humor makes that vulnerability readable, even bracing.