Writing Books Quotes

I do not think consciously of children [when writing] … I do know that children read me more intelligently than adults do. ~ Alan Garner

One of the most important lessons, perhaps, is the fact that SOFTWARE IS HARD. From now on I shall have significantly greater respect for every successful software tool that I encounter. During the past decade I was surprised to learn that the writing of programs for TeX and Metafont proved to be much more difficult than all the other things I had done (like proving theorems or writing books). The creation of good software demand a significiantly higher standard of accuracy than those other things do, and it requires a longer attention span than other intellectual tasks. ~ Donald Knuth

If I lose, then I have to accept that my way of writing books is not the way society says it's okay to write. ~ Asne Seierstad

Apart from writing books, my 40s have been about pursuing personal growth. Whatever were the mistakes of my earlier life, I've been committed to a pause, a regroup. I don't want to make the same mistakes in the future. ~ Monique Roffey

Graphomania (a mania for writing books) inevitably takes on epidemic proportions when a society develops to the point of creating three basic conditions: -
(1) an elevated level of general well being which allows people to devote themselves to useless activities
(2) a high degree of social atomization and , as a consequence, a general isolation of individuals;
(3) the absence of dramatic social changes in the nation's internal life. ~ Milan Kundera

I figure whatever I choose to create, I'll be neglecting somebody - so my art may as well make me happy. - Audrey Niffenegger ~ Jen Campbell

I thought of writing books myself once. I had the ideas; I even made notes. But I was a doctor, married with children. You can only do one thing well: Flaubert knew that. ~ Julian Barnes

Just handling this ocean of different books - new and used, in and out of print, famous and forgotten - it was literature as this giant mosaic of texts and experiments and attitudes. I think it's just very liberating to break out of a great man's theory of history.
I guess I've always liked working from that sense of - what would you call it? - license that the margins permit. I always just visualize myself writing books that were meant one day to be dusty, forgotten volumes being encountered by intrepid browsers in a used bookstore. It was a much less freighted way to think about trying to enter the conversation than to imagine I had to write The Great Gatsby. ~ Jonathan Lethem

I've been writing since I'm five years old. I've been writing books since high school - junior high, high school. I write every single day. I never thought I'd be published. ~ Karrine Steffans

Whenever people ask me, "How are your books doing?" or, "How is your book doing?" I just say, "It's okay." I mean, what am I supposed to say? I'm a writer; that means I write because I need to write, because that's how I breathe and that's how I bleed. I'm not an author; I'm a writer. Even when I don't want to write; I can't stop! So, how are my books doing? The hell I know! The moment after I publish one book, I'm writing another one! I don't know how my books are doing! I just know that I'm writing them! I'm a writer, I'm a writer. I'm not an author. ~ C. JoyBell C.

I have told people that writing this book has been like brushing away dirt from a fossil. What a load of shit. It has been like hacking away at a freezer with a screwdriver. ~ Amy Poehler

Writing books is the closest men ever come to childbearing. ~ Norman Mailer

When he was alive, you shared a great affinity. A love of writing, books, Shakespeare, journalism, a certain way of looking at the world," Marla says. "You must have felt very validated by him, understood for who you were. Your incredible connection to him was very empowering. ~ Donna Jackson Nakazawa

If a plot is a novel's skeleton, and characters are the muscle, then theme is its soul. ~ Janice Hardy

When I had my girls, I knew what magic felt like for the first time. I had created people who didn't exist before. Now I write for the same reason. Creating people and their life's stories through my writing is as close to magic as I'll ever get again. ~ Dori Ann Dupre

Writing a novel is like pottery. Your initial draft of your story is like a lump of clay. Editing is like shaping that piece of clay into something interesting and beautiful. ~ Monika Pardon

There has appeared in our time a particular class of books and articles which I sincerely and solemnly think may be called the silliest ever known among men ... these things are about nothing; they are about what is called Success. On every bookstall, in every magazine, you may find works telling people how to succeed. They are books showing men how to succeed in everything; they are written by men who cannot even succeed in writing books. To begin with, of course, there is no such thing as Success. Or, if you like to put it so, there is nothing that is not successful. That a thing is successful merely means that it is; a millionaire is successful in being a millionaire and a donkey in being a donkey ... I really think that the people who buy these books (if any people do buy them) have a moral, if not a legal, right to ask for their money back. ~ G.K. Chesterton

For me, my core genius lies in the area of teaching and motivating. I love to do it, I do it well, and people report that they get great value from it. Another core genius is compiling and writing books. Along with my co-author Mark Victor Hansen and others, I have written, co-authored, compiled and edited more than 200 books. ~ Jack Canfield

It comes a point in which you don't know if you write books or the books write you ~ Robin Sacredfire

You would like to know how I behave when I am experiencing pain, not writing books about it. You need not guess, for I will tell you; I am a great coward... If I knew any way of escape I would crawl through sewers to find it. But what is the good of telling you about my feelings? You know them already; they are the same as yours. I am not arguing that pain is not painful. Pain hurts. That is what the word means. I am only trying to show that the old Christian doctrine of being made 'perfect through suffering' is not incredible. To prove it palatable is beyond my design. ~ C.S. Lewis

While writing books about the past, I think about the present. It's not intentional, but somehow my books end up being written under the sign of a political mood. ~ Rick Perlstein

MFA in a Box is designed to help you to find the courage to put truth into words and to understand that writing is a life-and-death endeavor - but that nothing about a life-and-death endeavor keeps it from being laugh-out-loud funny. ~ John Rember

When I did start writing books, I didn't realize it, but the girls that grew up watching the show became moms. ~ Lisa Whelchel

I've figured out in the course of my life that the one thing I'm good at doing is writing books, and it would be crazy to trade that in for something else. ~ Francis Fukuyama

I've never really thought of writing books. I've never thought about stories as a part of a collection. ~ Deborah Eisenberg

I don't think the process of writing books is in any way sensible. It's not logical, and it's not reasonable. I do write very fast, and I just do it in a binge. Other people binge-drink; I binge-write. ~ Kerry Greenwood

One of the maddening ironies of writing books is that it leaves so little time for reading others'. My bedside is piled with books, but it's duty reading: books for book research, books for review. The ones I pine for are off on a shelf downstairs. ~ Mary Roach

I read Wolfe's new book _ The Story of a Novel_ and as usual he stole the whole damn thing from me. I am going to write and say will you please stop writing books you bastard. ~ Jean Stafford

The first book is the book you have to write to get back at your parents; the book you always had in you. Once you get that out of your way, you can start writing books, ~ Shirley Jackson

Write it. Just write it. Write it on receipts in the car while you wait for your kid to finish their piano lessons, scribble on napkins at lunch with friends. Type on crappy typewriters or borrow computers if you have to. Fill notebooks with ink. Write inside your head while you're in traffic and when you're sitting in the doctor's office. Write the truth, write lies. Write the perfect spouse. Write your dreams. Write your nightmares. Write while you cry about what you're writing, write while you laugh out loud at your own words. Write until your fingers hurt, then keep writing more. Don't ever stop writing. Don't ever give up on your story, no matter what "they" say. Don't ever let anybody take away your voice. You have something to say, your soul has a story to tell. Write it. There is never any reason to be afraid. Just write it and then put it out there for the world. Shove it up a flag pole and see who salutes it. Somebody will say it's crap. So what? Somebody else will love it. And that's what writing's about. Love. Love of the art, love of the story, and love for and from the people who really understand your work. Nobody else matters. Love yourself. Love your work. Be brave. Just write. ~ Melodie Ramone

I love writing books - I really do. If I could just quit everything and work on a book every day, I would love that most. ~ Donald Miller

Well I've been writing books. So that, by its nature, is kind of a solitary occupation. And from time to time I have research help, but mostly I've done those completely on my own. ~ Caroline Kennedy

I'm an author. We don't want to lead. We don't need to follow. We stay home and make stuff up and write it down and send it out into the world, and get inside people's heads. Perhaps we change the world and perhaps we don't. We never know. We just make stuff up. ~ Neil Gaiman

We find that firms with award-winning CEOs subsequently underperform, in terms both of stock and of operating performance. At the same time, CEO compensation increases, CEOs spend more time on activities outside the company such as writing books and sitting on outside boards, and they are more likely to engage in earnings management. ~ Daniel Kahneman

Your first written sentence is the foundation of all of your dreams. ~ Rob Bignell, Editor

Working 9 to 5 is structure. But tying lines together all hours of day is structure at its best performing magic. ~ C.C. Wyatt

[Writing] books is really fun because your "voice" is pretty undiluted. There is a very direct connection between yourself and your audience. You will have an editor, but their job is to help you clarify or improve your voice, not change it. ~ Liz Tuccillo

When I was just writing books and giving lectures, if people disagreed, they just didn't buy your book or attend your lectures. But, if you're leading a congregation, people feel they have the right to tell you what you should or shouldn't talk about. And that hasn't always been easy for me. ~ Marianne Williamson

Writing books can be very individual - one might strike you as helpful that someone else found useless, or that you might not have appreciated at some other time in your life. ~ Ann Leckie

Really, I don't like to do any household chores. There was a time when I loved to cook, but that was when I wasn't writing books. ~ Elaine Pagels

In non-fiction, I found John Gardner's two writing books to be tremendously helpful. ~ Ann Leckie

The hard part is putting one word after another. ~ Jo Linsdell

But those dealing in the actual manufacture of mind are dealing in a very explosive material. The material is not merely the clay of which man is master, but the truths or semblances of truth which have a certain mastery over man. The material is explosive because it must be taken seriously. The men writing books really are throwing bombs. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

For life is short and the art of writing books is very, very long. ~ James Geary

It seems like just yesterday my son was hiding under the table to avoid reading. Now, he's writing books longer than mine! ~ Rick Riordan

I've been writing books without ego for a very long time. I feel like it will get what it deserves. Or won't get what it doesn't deserve. ~ Hilary Liftin

A pencil and a dream can take you anywhere. ~ J. A. Meyer

I've always wrestled with the difference between plot and structure, and after re-reading a lot of writing books I realized I wasn't alone. ~ Jeff VanderMeer

If I send all the books that I faithfully wrote overseas, would that, for any chance, be considered work-shipping?? ~ Ana Claudia Antunes

By writing books, a man turns into a universe. ~ Milan Kundera

It always seems to me that one of the saddest things about the death of a literary man is the fact that the breaking-up of his collection of books almost invariably follows; the building up of a good library, the work of a lifetime, has been so much labour lost, so far as future generations are concerned. Talent, yes, and genius too, are displayed not only in writing books but also in buying them, and it is a pity that the ruthless hammer of the auctioneer should render so much energy and skill fruitless. ~ Stuart Dodgson Collingwood

It's the witching hour once more-
When the Muse comes out to play.
He calls me through that magic door-
Where galaxies of worlds await! ~ Belle Whittington

Certainly in the arts, in all genres, I think that men should step away. I think men should stop writing books. I think men should stop making movies or television. Say, for 50 to 100 years. ~ Eileen Myles

Where do storytellers find the wisdom to discover their own stories? From no place more mysterious than their own hearts. ~ Marion Dane Bauer

Ever since I was young, 14 or 15, I wondered if you could write a book that combined the visceral thrill of watching a movie with the total immersion you feel when you're inside a good book. And I had some success as a screenwriter before I began writing books. ~ Rick Yancey

When I'm writing books, something weird happens; and the result is the books contain a large amount of what you could call 'supernaturalism.' As a writer, I find I need that to explain the world I'm writing about. ~ Salman Rushdie

Being blind is the worst possible thing and asking me to read and write no more is torture. ~ Jessica E. Larsen

When we sit down to write, we psychically enter a sanctuary. This safe haven is our own personal space where we can say whatever is on our mind, where we can talk about what matters most to us, where we can imagine the kind of world that we would like to live. ~ Rob Bignell, Editor

The Calling means so much to me. It's this idea of perception and how the mythology of the universe and Earth have played out and how I get to re-write that based on my imagination and some of my true feelings. It's about being a man pushing 35 and not having a sense of direction. It's about finding love and being totally unwilling to let it go. - About Qualia ~ Stephan Lawrence Theodore Clifford

Writing books isn't a drastic departure from writing for the stage. I've always written in the long format, five, eight, 10-minute pieces rather than one-liners, so since writing books, the process hasn't changed much. A piece in my live routine can end up as part of one of my HBO specials, and it can also end up in one of the books. ~ George Carlin

When I started this book last year, I had a small reception in mind. A few copies in my hand to share with close friends, maybe a small gathering... I never imagined that my book would have its own ISBN number and be available to the public. I never imagined seeing my name next to the words, "published author." I feel so thankful that this has worked out so well for me. God is good! ~ Kristyn Van Cleave

The process of creation can be unpredictable and, in some way, similar to love: the brightest waves of inspiration may sometimes occur in wrong timing, wrong places, or even with wrong people. ~ Sahara Sanders

I think when you first start out, you're writing books that are about your immediate place. ~ Jami Attenberg

The writer's silent mind is a period of intermission before orchestrating a symphony of words. ~ Khaled Talib

One of the seminar organizers joins me. "Is Yvonne giving you a hard time?" Yvonne. My nemesis is none other than the cadaver beheader. As if turns out, she's also the lab manager, the person responsible when things go wrong, such as writers fainting and/or getting sick to their stomach and then going home and writing books that refer to anatomy lab managers as beheaders. ~ Mary Roach

Ten years from now I plan to be sitting here, looking out over my land. I hope I'll be writing books, but if not, I'll be on my pond fishing with my kids. I feel like the luckiest guy I know. ~ John Grisham

I think being an only child created in me a degree of self-reliance, which I'm glad of. It made me perfectly happy with my own company and perhaps was good conditioning for the protracted solitude of writing books as slowly as I do. ~ Alan Hollinghurst

I would not see our candle blown out in the wind. It is a small thing, this dear gift of life handed us mysteriously out of immensity. I would not have that gift expire ... If I seem to be beating a dead horse again and again, I must protest: No! I am beating, again and again, living man to keep him awake and move his limbs and jump his mind ... What's the use of looking at Mars through a telescope, sitting on panels, writing books, if it isn't to guarantee, not just the survival of mankind, but mankind surviving forever! ~ Ray Bradbury

I organize a chess festival in Hungary. I support chess in schools, and I have my own chess foundation. And I started writing books. ~ Garry Kasparov

People like Pete Peterson, the former secretary of commerce and Blackstone and titan of Wall Street, etc., has been writing books for years about the debt and deficit. ~ Mario Cuomo

Those that spend the greater part of their time in reading or writing books are, of course, apt to take rather particular notice of accumulations of books when they come across them. They will not pass a stall, a shop, or even a bedroom-shelf without reading some title, and if they find themselves in an unfamiliar library, no host need trouble himself further about their entertainment. The putting of dispersed sets of volumes together, or the turning right way up of those which the dusting housemaid has left in an apoplectic condition, appeals to them as one of the lesser Works of Mercy. ~ M.R. James

I absolutely adore writing books with paranormal elements - and I love creating the often-complex worlds and/or plots that go along with those stories - but at the heart of all of that ,you have the characters, and when you get down to the core of it, it's spending the time with the characters that is what I truly love. ~ Julie Kenner

If thou need money, get it in an honest way by keeping books, if thou wilt, but not by writing books. ~ John Lancaster Spalding

Why am I writing books in my old age? Who am I trying to impress? Why go on? the answer is fear of golf. ~ David Taylor

I don't know how old I was when I started writing books. But, I was born in 1931, and I wrote my first book in 1961. ~ Ed Emberley

Nobody wanted me. I just kept writing books and learning my craft. Most writers aren't very good in the beginning. ~ Phyllis A. Whitney

Perhaps reading and writing books is one of the last defences human dignity has left, because in the end they remind us of what God once reminded us before He too evaporated in this age of relentless humiliations - that we are more than ourselves; that we have souls. ~ Richard Flanagan

The orator yields to the inspiration of a transient occasion, and speaks to the mob, before him, to those who can hear him; but the writer, whose more equable life is his crowd which inspire the orator, speaks to the intellect and heart of mankind, to all in any age who can understand him. ~ Henry David Thoreau

Then there were his education and his reading, the books he bought and borrowed, his knowledge of things that could not be eaten or worn or cohabited with, his interest in poetry and his respect for good writing. ~ John Steinbeck

It's not a job but a condition.
(Alan Garner on writing) ~ Alan Garner

I would probably have been very content as a scholar to have carried on organising exhibitions and writing books and teaching. ~ Thomas P. Campbell

The world is getting noisier. We've gone from boomboxes to Walkmen to portable CD players to iPods to any song we want, whenever we want it. We've gone from the four television channels of my childhood to the seeming infinity of cable and streaming. As technology moves us faster and faster through time and space, it seems to feel like story is getting pushed out of the way, I mean, literally pushed out of the narrative. But even as our engagement with stories change, or the trappings around it morph from book to audio to Instagram to Snapchat, we must remember our finger beneath the words. Remember that story, regardless of the format, has always taken us to places we never thought we'd go, introduced us to people we never thought we'd meet and shown us worlds that we might have missed. So as technology keeps moving faster and faster, I am good with something slower. My finger beneath the words has led me to a life of writing books for people of all ages, books meant to be read slowly, to be savored. ~ Jacqueline Woodson

What if a villain exists in all of us? ~ Aly Zigada

I've done everything I wanted to do, writing books, learning about things, but I've been swindled all the same because it's never anything more. ~ Simone De Beauvoir

Attributing to another author, Writing a novel is like setting a goal and walking there in your sleep. ~ Karl Ove Knausgaard

Since I was trying so hard to make books lead my life, I didn't want to read them and then just put them back on the shelf and say, "good book," as if I was patting a good dog. I wanted books to change me, and I wanted to write books that would change others. ~ Jack Gantos

A person can internalize their expressible thoughts and employ such ideas to modify human behavior. ~ Kilroy J. Oldster

If you are serious, and you want to make a living as an author, then you need to hustle. Period. If you can't make that quality, then you need to concentrate on your craft and practice more.
One other thing, quality comes with practice. If you are prolific, then you become a better writer because you are writing. The more you do anything the better at it you will become. So in a way, quantity does add to quality. ~ Larry Correia

Aut viam inveniam aut faciam

It means, in essence, "I'll find a way or I'll make one." It's how I live my life. Another definition is basically "Never give up," which is the path I've taken when it comes to writing books. I've been writing for almost 30 years and just had my first book, THE LOSSES, come out by a small press. And I'm psyched. Just keep on trucking. ~ Cully Perlman

There was this book Dad used to read to me every night called "The Giving Tree." It was a really good book, but the back of it had a picture of the author, this guy named Shel Silverstein.
But Shel Silverstein looks more like a burglar or a pirate than a guy who should be writing books for kids.
Dad must have known that picture kind of freaked me out, because one night after I got out of bed, Dad said: "IF YOU GET OUT OF BED AGAIN TONIGHT, YOU'LL PROBABLY RUN INTO SHEL SILVERSTEIN IN THE HALLWAY."
That really did the trick, Ever since then, I STILL don't get out of bed at night, even if I really need to use the bathroom. ~ Jeff Kinney

People very often say to me, 'How did you do it, how did you raise a baby and write a book?' And the answer is - I didn't do housework for four years. I am not Superwoman. And um, living in squalor, that was the answer. ~ J.K. Rowling

What I find cool about being a banned author is this: I'm writing books that evoke a reaction, books that, if dropped in a lake, go down not with a whimper but a splash. ~ Lauren Myracle

We don't perceive a contradiction between writing books, making films or producing a television program. These days you can't choose how you want to express yourself anymore. ~ Alexander Kluge

Culture is everything. Culture is the way we dress, the way we carry our heads, the way we walk, the way we tie our ties - it is not only the fact of writing books or building houses. ~ Aime Cesaire

Half hating, half loving, this free time between writing books. ~ K.J. Mecklenfeld

It is has been a long time since I have written one of my statuses about life. I have been very busy trying to promote my Fan page, Friends and services, and my books. However, I can tell you all one thing for certain. I am not a Quitter. I will not stop writing books. I will not stop pushing myself to succeed. I will not stop being who I am.
I am a winner. Winning is an attitude. You take the good with the bad and you keep on going. It gets hard, you get tired and sometimes burnt out but you keep on going anyway, because you can.
Winners have setbacks, but winners learn tighten their belts and go on. Winner look at what has gone wrong and instead of complaining they find ways of doing it better. Winners know that Rome was not built in a day and take every day as it comes.
Winners do not whine, they roar. ~ Alexander Stone

Writing a story about a place calls that world into existence. Sometimes, as the author, you accompany it for a while. But even as you write, the characters have minds of their own. ~ Alan McCluskey

Someone asked me, 'How do you write a book?' I said, 'I live with a pen in one hand. ~ Carla H. Krueger

As so often happens in my strange writing process, after weeks of distraction; of not thinking about the book at all; yesterday I started writing before the sun was up, or coffee was made. Whipped out a whole chapter of probably six or seven separate scenes in less than two hours. Now today, the whole story has slipped into a deeper level of knowing and connections than has (as far as I know, anyway) ever really been written about before. This is much as my experience was with Ailana, when I kept slipping into deeper and deeper gears. Bringing forth insights I myself had never learned or suspected. ~ Edward Fahey

Smart people often talk trash about happiness and worse than trash about books on happiness, and they have been doing so for centuries - just as long as other people have been pursuing happiness and writing books about it. ~ Amy Bloom