The ‘ten rules’ of Elmore Leonard are as good as anything to start with, although they’re all rules that I break from time to time. That’s what rules are for.
The thing about advice is, well, it’s useless unless wanted, valueless unless drawn from experience and pointless if offered to someone who knows better, or more. I know a little about a lot, a lot about a little, and everything about nothing.
More often than not, what people are really after is information, or possibly guidance. What to do and how to go about it. The advice but is usually thrown in for free as a take-it-or-leave-it kind of thing. Which suits me—if you don’t like it, google it.
metabaronic 