Bruce Coville Quotes

The real heroes are the librarians and teachers who at no small risk to themselves refuse to lie down and play dead for censors.

The first draft of a story is the writer's clay.

Ideas are all around you - everything gives you ideas. But the real source is the part of your brain that dreams.

Most of all, I love being a storyteller. And yes, I want to make a good living, but I'm not always driven by the best commercial sense.

Time becomes very weird. Sometimes it seems as if the hours are rushing by in a blur, the moment of performance hurtling toward me. Other times the clock seems to poke along like a sloth with chronic fatigue syndrome.

My writing works best when I remember that bookish child who adored reading and gear the work toward him.

Hearts grow hard and weary. Pain spreads, and joy diminishes. Those who hated you hate you still, but those who loved you, or would have loved you, or wanted to love you but never had the chance, are being scraped hollow by a loss they don't understand. Come home. Please come home. We are withering without you.

You should make someone a wonderful husband."
Even the tips of Jamie's ears were crimson now. But instead of retreating, he clenched his jaw and looked directly into her eyes.
"I suppose I would," he said. "Are you interested?

Chains," said the Tinker, coming up behind her. "They bind us, whether we want them to or not. But a heart without chains would have nothing to hold it, might simply blow away.

In terms of age, I think I've covered about as wide a range as is possible, having written everything from picture books to early chapter books to middle grade novels to YA to one adult novel - and having been editor and lead writer for a magazine for retired people!

If you don't jump, the wings never come.

Sometimes when you mend a chain, the place where you fix it is strongest of all ... Never was a chain that couldn't be broken. Sometimes its even a good idea.

Gadfangled girl things, always robbed me of my common sense.

How in the world do you tellyour wife that her mother was born a unicon?

I feel like a very lucky person. From the time I was young, I had a dream of becoming a writer. Now that dream has come true, and I am able to make my living doing something I really love.

I am ignoring you. In fact, I think you are a figment of my imagination.

Wherever they may have come from, and wherever they may have gone,
unicorns live inside the true believer's heart.
Which means as long as we can dream, there will be unicorns.

I tend to be more of a novel writer. In fact, some of my novels started out as short stories, and I just got carried away! I think some of my best writing is in the short story form, but novels come more naturally to me.

Across the gently rolling hills,
Beyond high mountain peaks,
Along the shores of distant seas,
There's something my heart seeks.

But there's no peace in wandering,
The road's not made for rest.
And footsore fools will never know
What home might suit them best.

But, oh, the things that I have seen,
The secret paths I've trod,
The hidden corners of the world
Known to none but me and God.

Yes, the world was meant for knowing,
And feet were meant to roam.
But one who's always going
Will never find a home.

Oh, where's the thread that binds me,
The voice that calls me back?
Where's the love that finds me -
And what's the root I lack?

Travel safe, travel well. May those who have gone before be always with you.

I like fixing things," he said as he worked. "The world is always breaking, here and there, this way and that. Fix a bit of it, and I feel like I'm helping.

Lights and darks. And suddenly i was here, where everything seems strange. And I don't know why. Like the Fox and the Crow, I don't know the whole story yet. But that's a good reason to go on, don't you think?"
"Go where?" said the Scarecrow.
"Go forward," said the girl. "See something. Learn something. Figure it out. We won't ever get the whole thing, I bet, but we'll get something. And then we'll have something to tell when we're old about what happened to us when we were young."
"Now?" said the Scarecrow. "Can you tell it now?"
"After," said the girl. "We have to have the BEFORE first, and that's life"
"And what's life?" said the scarecrow.
"Moving," said the girl. "Moving on. Shall we move on? Will you come with me?

All these guys picking on smart kids and calling them geeks and dweebs are going to grow up and want to know why they don't do something about the terrible state the world is in. I can tell you why. By the time they grow up, most of the kids who realy could have changed things are wrecked.

Family isn't blood," she said bitterly, continuing to back away. "Family is who loves you, who takes care of you.

When I go into schools to speak, I am not giving a speech - it's really a one-man show. I call it 'didactic standup.'

Hey, Geekoid!" yelled Duncan Dougal, "Why do you read so much? Don't you know how to watch TV?

Withholding information is the essence of tyranny. Control of the flow of information is the tool of the dictatorship.

That sense of loss grew within the humans who had been left behind, left to live without unicorns. Even the ones who had never seen a unicorn, never heard of a unicorn, felt the passing of something sweet and wonderful. It was as if the air had surrendered a bit of its spice, the water a bit of its sparkle, the night a bit of its mystery.

You need them both, Thatcher. Talent and discipline. One without the other is useless.