Partway through our conversation about his new book *Good Writing: How to Improve Your Sentence*s, Neal Allen lost his train of thought. He turned toward his wife and co-author, Anne Lamott. The two riffed briefly, their faces slightly angled away from their computer and from me. “It will come back,” Lamott said. He nodded briefly and repeated: “It will come back.” And it did. “Oh!” Allen said, facing the screen, and off we went. It was a small exchange, the kind you might expect from a married couple, but I jotted it down anyway, sensing it may prove significant. As we talked, the two continued to finish each other’s thoughts, nudging one another forward, even setting the record straight. (At one point, Lamott said Allen introduced his 36 “writing rules” on their second date. Allen reminded her: “In the book, you say it was the fourth or fifth.”) I realized that their back-and-forth mirrored *Good Writing*’s structure, but in an improvised miniature.…