In a month of gratitude, I want to put a shout out to all those who help other writers become better at their craft so they can continue to feed my book addiction. My motto has always been: Life is Too Short for Bad Fiction. You can see my own contributions (the Story Building Blocks  series) to this effort on my website . I love looking through the Great Courses Catalog that comes through the mail. A long string of classes on DVDs and books line our shelves. You can learn everything from history, mathematics, and science to the humanities all in the comfort of your living room, office, or car, via DVD player or downloads onto your PC. Years ago I found the course Building Great Sentences   by Brooks Landon . It changed my writing forever. I vaguely remembered diagramming sentences in high school, but this course turned language into building blocks that are as colorful and versatile as L EGO®s . As if reading my mind that writers needed more master classes in w...