“I came into science fiction at a very good time, when the doors were getting thrown open to all kinds of more experimental writing, more literary writing, riskier writing. It wasn't all imitation Heinlein or Asimov. And of course, women were creeping in, infiltrating. Infesting the premises.” WritingKindCoursesFictionDoorsScience FictionVery GoodAll KindsThrownGood TimesImitationPremises Author:Ursula K. Le Guin
“I consider fiction a very high-class form of lying. I enjoy and admire it enormously, but I don't think I'm very good at it.” ThinkingFormLyingEnjoyFictionClassVery GoodAdmireHigh Class Author:Diane Ackerman
“The fatal flaw of most utopian visions is that they're fundamentally static, and that's not a comfortable place for humans to live. Fourier was very good at imagining a utopia that is constantly changing and very busy, but a vision of paradise that would have been most tantalizing to an underfed overworked factory worker in 1840 doesn't have much appeal in fiction because it's not a story.” HumansHas BeensStoriesFictionVisionComfortableWorkersBusyVery GoodAppealsParadiseFlawsFactoriesUtopiaStaticUtopianFactory WorkersTantalizingFatal FlawsFourier Author:Christine Jennings
“Journeys become very good metaphors. They always have the character put into circumstances that reveal him. If I had based my characters in New York and had them just sitting and thinking about life, it would be like what contemporary U.S. fiction is about. That is very heavy, literally, for me. It doesn't become mainstream enough because the pages don't turn themselves.” IfsThinkingEnoughCharacterWould BeTurnsFictionJourneyNew YorkCircumstancesPagesSittingVery GoodMetaphorHeavyContemporaryMainstreamThinking About Life Author:Karan Bajaj
“Every good story needs a complication. We learn this fiction-writing fundamental in courses and workshops, by reading a lot or, most painfully, through our own abandoned story drafts. After writing twenty pages about a harmonious family picnic, say, or a well-received rock concert, we discover that a story without a complication flounders, no matter how lovely the prose. A story needs a point of departure, a place from which the character can discover something, transform himself, realize a truth, reject a truth, right a wrong, make a mistake, come to terms.” NeedsWritingWellsMatterCharacterStoriesCoursesReadingTermRealizingMistakeFictionRocksPagesTwentiesFundamentalsVery GoodLovelyProseRejectsConcertsAbandonedHarmoniousGood StoryDepartureWorkshopsFiction WritingComplicationPicnicsRock Concerts Author:Monica Wood