“I usually do at least a dozen drafts and progressively make more-conscious decisions. Because I've always believed stories are closer to poems than novels, I spend a lot of time on the story's larger rhythms, such as sentence and paragraph length, placement of flashbacks and dialogue.” StoriesDecisionNovelConsciousSentencesDialogueRhythmLengthDozenAlways BelieveParagraphPlacementFlashback Author:Ron Rash
“The single most important technique for making progress is to write ten words. Doesn't matter if you're badly stuck, or your day is completely jam-packed, or you're away from your computer - carry a small paper notebook and write a sentence of description while you're waiting on line at a coffee shop. I think of this as baiting a hook. Even if you have a few days in a row where nothing comes except those ten words, I find that as long as you have to think about the novel enough to write ten words, the chances are that more will come.” IfsThinkingWritingLongImportantMatterEnoughWaitingLinesChanceNovelProgressTenPaperComputerSentencesTechniqueCoffeeStuckShopsDescriptionHookJamChances AreNotebookCoffee Shop Author:Naomi Novik
“almost all American writers tend to overwrite, to tell too much. I get the disillusioned feeling that novels, today, are sold by the pound, like groceries. It actually takes a great deal more discipline to be able to leave out rather than to throw in everything. This means that you have to say in one sentence precisely what you mean, instead of saying sort of what you kind of mean in hundreds of sentences and hoping the sum total will add up.” KindMeanFeelingsTodayAbleDealsNovelToo MuchDisciplineAddSentencesPoundsGroceriesDisillusionedOne SentenceAmerican Writer Author:Rona Jaffe
“The writing in Mission to Paris, sentence after sentence, page after page, is dazzling. If you are a John le Carr fan, this is definitely a novel for you.” IfsWritingNovelFansPagesMissionsSentencesParisDazzling Author:James Patterson
“I'm no lyrical stylist, you wouldn't pick me for a perfect sentence, and I certainly wouldn't describe my novels as intellectual.” PerfectNovelIntellectualPicksSentencesLyricalStylistPick Me Author:Joanna Trollope
“Monkey Beach is a moody, powerful novel full of memorable characters. Reading it was like entering a pool of emerald water to discover a haunted world shivering with loss and love, regret and sorrow, where the spirit world is as real as the human. I was sucked into it with the very first sentence and when I left, it was with a feeling of immense reluctance.” WorldFirstsHumansRealCharacterFeelingsSpiritReadingLeftWaterLossPowerfulNovelRegretSorrowAnd LoveSentencesBeachMemorablePoolImmenseMonkeysEnteringMoodyReluctanceEmeraldsSpirit WorldMemorable Characters Author:Anita Rau Badami
“A reader, encountering a sentence about a barking dog, would have to dwell on why that choice was made at that moment. Everything in a novel is explicitly chosen, whereas some of what a film captures feels incidental, according to the vagaries of photography and sound recording.” FeelsMadeMomentsFilmChoicesSoundNovelDogReaderPhotographySentencesChosenThat MomentCaptureBarking Dogs Author:Jonathan Lethem
“Novels are almost like music or poetry - they just come to me in simple sentences, whereas I think my pieces get more and more complex ever since I've started using a computer.” ThinkingSimpleNovelPiecesComputerComplexesSentences Author:Joan Didion
“What works in a story is very different than what works in cinema. For example, dialogue in books: If you translate it too faithfully, it sounds a little stilted, because we often don't speak the way we speak in novels. Oral language is much punchier, shorter sentences.” IfsWayLittlesBookDifferentStoriesSpeakLanguageSoundNovelExampleSentencesDialogueCinemaTranslate Author:Yann Martel
“I don't begin a novel until I have written, not just the last sentence, but usually, as a result thereof, many of the surrounding final paragraphs, so that in addition to knowing what happens, I know what the voice is.” KnowsHappensLastsVoiceResultsNovelKnowingWrittenFinalsSentencesParagraph Author:John Irving
“For me writing is an organic process that starts with engaging the language and then thinking about the structure of the novel as you move along. Especially in revision you start to notice correlations. Things come up, not self-consciously, because you're busy feeling your way through sentences and trying to push the language into new places.” ThinkingWayWritingTryingSelfFeelingsMovingLanguageProcessNovelStructureBusyCome UpSentencesEngagingRevisionCorrelationNew Places Author:Dana Spiotta
“Read non-fiction. History, biology, entomology, mineralogy, paleontology. Get a bodyguard and do fieldwork. Find your inner fish. Don't publish too soon. Not before you have read Thomas Mann in any case. Learn by copying, sentence by sentence some of the masters. Copy Coetzee's or Sebald's sentences and see what happens to your story. Consider creative non-fiction if you want to stay in South Africa. It might be the way to go. Never neglect back and hamstring exercises, otherwise you won't be able to write your novel. One needs one's buttocks to think.” IfsThinkingWayWantNeedsWritingStoriesMightHappensAbleFictionCasesNovelCreativeMastersExerciseSouthFishesSentencesBiologyNeglectCopiesSouth AfricaPublishNon FictionCopyingBodyguardPaleontologyButtocksFieldworkHamstringsCoetzee Author:Marlene van Niekerk
“I am finding it very hard to get my novel started. I suffer from stylistic abscesses; and sentences keep itching without coming to a head.” HardSufferingNovelFindingsSentencesItching Book:The Letters of Gustave Flaubert: 1830-1857 Source: The Letters of Gustave Flaubert: 1830-1857
“And yet my, not only my faith, but my experience has led me to believe that the world is not a construction of space and time and matter and energy. That that mapping is insufficient. That the world is instead some kind of a linguistic construct. It is more in the nature of a sentence, or a novel, or a work of art than it is in the nature of these machine models of interlocking law that we inherit out of a thousand years of rational reductionism.” WorldYearsBelieveKindArtMatterLawEnergySpaceNovelThousandModelsMachinesSentencesRationalWorks Of ArtConstructionThousand YearsConstructsTime And SpaceInsufficientMappingReductionismMatter And Energy Author:Terence McKenna
“And I don't want to begin something, I don't want to write that first sentence until all the important connections in the novel are known to me. As if the story has already taken place, and it's my responsibility to put it in the right order to tell it to you.” IfsWantWritingFirstsImportantStoriesOrderResponsibilityKnownNovelTakenConnectionsSentencesAlready Taken Author:John Irving
“I don't begin a novel or a screenplay until I know the ending. And I don't mean only that I have to know what happens. I mean that I have to hear the actual sentences. I have to know what atmosphere the words convey.” KnowsWritingMeanHappensNovelSentencesAtmosphereScreenplays Author:John Irving
“The mental state I'm in is completely different, but the act of trying to write is the same. I mean, in all instances you try to write good sentences. But in a novel you're free to do whatever you want, and in the autobiographical works you can't make things up.” WantWritingTryingMeanDifferentStatesNovelSentencesInstanceDo Whatever You Want Author:Paul Auster
“A Heart So White is simply one of the best novels I know. I'm also thrilled by Javier Marías sentences, by how elegant they are while also being so permissive in relation to the niceties of grammar and so open to the prospect of surprise. He's a genius.” KnowsHeartWhiteNovelGeniusRelationSurpriseSentencesMarsElegantGrammarNiceties Author:Garth Greenwell
“Even within single sentences, there are sudden changes of register. And when the travellers go to Venice, they see a play by Voltaire! This is a novel [Candid] which has narratives within narratives, such as when Cunégonde recounts her story.” PlayStoriesNovelSentencesNarrativeTravellerVeniceRegisterCandidSingle SentenceSudden Change Author:Mark Ravenhill