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Quote by Matt de la Pena

“All that matters to me as a reader are characters. I want characters to be real, authentic, and rounded. I will be digging into characters for at least a month. Who they are. What they are like. Outside of the story.”

Quote by Matt de la Pena

Author

Matt de la Pena

Matt de la Pena, born on September 9, 1951, is an American writer whose works span a variety of genres, including novels, poetry, and young adult literature. He is known for his profound social insight and depiction of multiculturalism. more

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“Once I start writing, I am a huge reviser. To me writing is revising. I probably turn over every sentence that I write, to see if I have the rhythm right. That's why my first drafts take a really long time.”

Ifs Writing Firsts Long Turns Huge Long Time Sentences Rhythm Really Long Revising

Author:Matt de la Pena

“Whenever I teach writing I tell them to never revise as you go. Finish the first draft. This is my writing advice. I can't do that myself. I'm lying to everybody. I write a paragraph, and then I rewrite that paragraph. I want to feel like I'm standing on firm ground before I move on to the next paragraph. Mentally, I have to do that.”

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Author:Matt de la Pena

“A man can do a television interview and roll out of bed 15 minutes before; it's just not the same for a woman. A woman has to pay attention to her hair, makeup, clothing, and jewelry choices.”

Men Choices Can Do Pay Attention Minutes Television Hair Bed Pay Attention Interviews Makeup Clothings Jewelry

Author:Michele Bachmann

“To me, if the writing doesn't have rhythm, it feels dead. I lose all confidence. The music has to emerge to feel confident enough to move on to the next major chapter.”

Ifs Feels Writing Enough Moving Next Loses Majors Rhythm Chapters

Author:Matt de la Pena

“When you first quit your regular job and you become a full-time writer, you are paralyzed with free time. You have so much free time. When you are at home, you have a guitar. There's a cat. You got to find ways to create an environment when writing is like going to work. Be efficient with the hours you put into the book. So I go there the same time, every day - like 7:30 am - and I leave around 2 pm, or longer, if I have a deadline.”

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Author:Matt de la Pena

“When I'm there, it's pure silence. There are other writers there, too, and I get super competitive. I have this weird fear that some guy next to me is writing this amazing novel, so I got to compete.”

Writing Guy Next Silence Novel Pure

Author:Matt de la Pena

“As an author, you go into the school, it gets written about in the paper. It sucks that your book was banned, but you almost benefit from it. The bummer is all of the incredible educators. Nobody is writing about them. They are on the frontlines still, to this day, fighting to reinstate those programs.”

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Author:Matt de la Pena

“This is me putting it simply; the politicians are one demographic and they see that Arizona is changing. I feel like the only instinct to retain power is to have education favor you. You have this Mexican American program that helps kids take ownership of their race and their power. It threatens the political powers that are in place.”

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Author:Matt de la Pena

“I only know what it's like to be an author with social media. I can't compare. I do think we lose the mystery of the author. Today, I get tons of e-mails and Facebook messages from readers, and my goal with Twitter and Facebook is, if someone reaches out to me, I'm going to respond to them. I don't want to be an elitist author who is untouchable. I'm just a regular person, too. I will always respond to everybody.”

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Author:Matt de la Pena

“My fear is you have to be careful as a writer to not get caught up in social media and blogging, because it can start to feed into your writing time. When you are writing a book, it's such a long journey where the payoff is way at the end, sometimes years away. The payoff of the blog post is today. You get the reinforcement, comments or "likes" immediately. It's appealing. You have to be patient with the book.”