Best novel & stories Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings Page 5

“Even in traditional filmmaking, you're always trying to find novel ways of telling stories, and this is different.”

Way Trying Different Stories Novel Traditional Filmmaking Always Trying Telling Stories

“If I can give a young author any advice, whatsoever, never let anyone announce the film sale of your first novel. Film rights are sold to almost every novel, but it shouldn't be the lead story in your first engagement with the press. Then you end up getting reviews like "a novel made for the screen" and things like that.”

Ifs Giving Firsts Made I Can Ends Stories Film Young Novel Rights Advice Presses Screens Reviews Engagement

Author:William Monahan

“A man who is not born with the novel-writing gift has a troublesome time of it when he tries to build a novel. I know this from experience. He has no clear idea of his story; in fact he has no story. He merely has some people in his mind, and an incident or two, also a locality, and he trusts he can plunge those people into those incidents with interesting results.”

Source: The Complete Works of Mark Twain: All 13 Novels, Short Stories, Poetry and Essays

“We read novels. We read hundreds of pages of words, when the story is good because we're willing to stay there. I hope the story is good. I'm going into this venture thinking that the audience is really smart and really wants to hear all the nuances of what we're saying.”

Thinking Want Stories Novel Audience Willing Pages Smart Venture Nuance Really Smart

Author:Veena Sud

“I feel quite at home writing short stories but nervous and anxious when writing novels, as if the bad time of consecutive failures might arise again.”

Ifs Feels Writing Stories Home Might Novel Arise Nervous Short Story Anxious Bad Times Consecutive Writing Short Writing Short Stories

Author:Charles Baxter

“I prefer short stories, but publishers would, of course, rather that writers produce novels, since novels are still more commercially viable.”

Stills Stories Courses Novel Produce Short Story Publishers

Author:Charles Baxter

“The graphic novel? I love comics and so, yes. I don't think we talked about that. We weren't influenced necessarily by graphic novels but we certainly, once the screenplay was done, we talked about the idea that you could continue, you could tell back story, you could do things in sort of a graphic novel world just because we kind of like that world.”

Thinking World Kind Ideas Done Stories Novel Graphic Screenplays Graphic Novels

Author:Todd Farmer

“All my writing-life people kept telling me that I should stop writing short stories and start writing novels: my agent, my Israeli publisher, my foreign ones, my bank manager - they all felt and keep feeling that I'm doing something wrong here.”

People Should Writing Stories Feelings Felt Novel Agents Managers Short Story Publishers Writing Life Israeli Writing Short Writing Short Stories

Author:Etgar Keret

“Most people can start a short story or a novel. If you're a writer, you can finish them. Finish enough of them, and you may be good enough to be publishable.”

People Ifs May Enough Stories Novel Be Good Good Enough Short Story

Author:Neil Gaiman

“When I write my novels I don't really have a huge plan beforehand; I don't have the whole plot and architecture, so the story is sort of discovered as I write it.”

Writing Whole Stories Novel Plans Huge Architecture Plot

Author:Michael Ondaatje

“When you write a novel you have to live with the characters for a long time. So I prefer short stories. I never wrote anything more than 250 pages.”

Writing Long Character Stories Novel Pages Long Time Short Story

Author:Ruskin Bond

“In most novels, the landscape, or the place, in which the story takes part is simply a backdrop to the human action.”

Humans Stories Action Novel Landscape Human Actions Backdrop

Author:Paul Kingsnorth

“A form wherein we can enjoy simultaneously what is best in both the novel and the short story form. My plan was to create a book that affords readers some of the novel's long-form pleasures but that also contains the short story's ability to capture what is so difficult about being human - the brevity of our moments, their cruel irrevocability.”

Humans Long Book Moments Stories Form Enjoy Difficult Ability Pleasure Novel Plans Reader Capture Short Story Being Human Brevity

Author:Junot Diaz

“Usually at the end of each story we're thrown clear out of the story's world and then we're given a new world to enter. What's unique about a linked collection is that it can deliver both sets of narrative pleasures - the novel's long immersion into character-world and the story anthology's energetic (and mortal) brevity - the linked collection is unique in its ability to be both abrupt and longitudinal simultaneously.”

World Long Ends Character Stories Given Ability Pleasure Novel Clear Unique Mortals Narrative Collections Thrown New World Linked Energetic Brevity Anthology Immersion

Author:Junot Diaz

“There's a difference between doing memoir and writing a novel. If I had put the story of the boy killing my dog - and that was Eric also, what a little monster he was! - in a novel, even if I took it directly from life, it would be fiction.”

Ifs Writing Littles Stories Would Be Differences Fiction Boys Novel Dog Killing Monsters Memoir My Dog Eric Doing Me

Author:Paul Auster

“I'm a professional. So before I published any novels, I'd always been writing stories.”

Writing Stories Novel Writing Stories

Author:Jess Walter

“I think the path to becoming a writer has become more through the novel. It's easier to get a novel published than a book of stories, obviously, especially through big publishers.”

Thinking Book Stories Bigs Novel Path Becoming Easier Publishers

Author:Jess Walter

“I started writing when I was a journalist. But every time I sat down to write a novel or a story, I ended up writing about myself, which was incredibly annoying and self-involved.”

Writing Self Stories Novel Involved Journalist Sat Annoying

Author:Damian Barr

“In terms of the economics, yes obviously the rise of e-books and how people choose to read books has a big effect on the economics of the game. But whether people are buying them on paper or downloading them there's still some poor wretch in a room who is trying to write a poem, write a story, write a novel. And so my job doesn't change. It's just how people receive it and economic conditions on the ground change, but that doesn't affect what I write.”

People Writing Trying Stills Book Stories Bigs Jobs Games Term Poor Rooms Novel Economic Conditions Effects Paper Economics Buying

Author:Colson Whitehead

“I'm trying to break myself of that habit [of not writing out a first draft ] because I'm working on a couple novels and I know if I tried to write those books the way I wrote the stories it would take me years to finish.”

Ifs Knows Way Writing Trying Years Firsts Book Stories Break Novel Couple Habit Take Me

Author:Donald Ray Pollock

“We like to look out on the world and see ourselves, so we have many, many novels, memoirs, and short stories in Iraq that are largely about Americans in Iraq, doing what Americans do.”

World Looks Stories Novel Iraq Memoir Short Story

Author:Elliott Colla

“Each piece of writing I undertake, whether a story, novel, play, or poem, begins with an image.”

Writing Play Stories Novel Pieces

Author:Norman Lock

“It may be old hat, but I see no reason to close off what is for me a fruitful subject of inquiry, especially so for one, like me, who is very much interested in creating stories and novels of ideas.”

May Ideas Reason Stories Novel Subjects Creating Like Me Hats No Reason Inquiry Creating Stories

Author:Norman Lock

“I really want to write a novel. A few years ago I went so far as to do the cliché thing and rent this house in upstate [New York]. I still have the story, but I got 15,000, 20,000 words in and it was like, This is falling apart. I can't figure out.”

Want Writing Years Stills I Can Stories Fall House Novel Figures New York Years Ago Falling Apart Upstate New York

Author:Craig Finn

“Once I had started, I discovered the secret pleasure of writing a novel. It's such an immersive, deep commitment. With short stories, you're continually having to start again from scratch, but with a novel you only need one good idea every few years.”

Needs Writing Years Ideas Stories Pleasure Secret Novel Commitment Short Story Good Ideas Scratches

Author:Debra Dean

“have a much harder time writing stories than novels. I need the expansiveness of a novel and the propulsive energy it provides. When I think about scene - and when I teach scene writing - I'm thinking about questions. What questions are raised by a scene? What questions are answered? What questions persist from scene to scene to scene?”

Thinking Needs Writing Stories Energy Teach Novel Scene Harder Raised Persist Writing Stories Expansiveness

Author:Edan Lepucki

“With my students, I don't offer any simple tips like that, maybe because my own process is pretty messy, but when we workshop we talk a lot about the deeper subject, which is what the story or novel is about. I think defining a narrative's themes can lay bare a narrative's tensions.”

Thinking Stories Process My Own Simple Novel Subjects Students Offers Lays Deeper Narrative Tension Theme Defining Messy Workshops

Author:Edan Lepucki

“It's an unusual way to write a crime novel, to have these lingering, fairly large story points, but it's something I knew I had to do if I wanted to write a sequel...but, you know, people still have to read and enjoy this book, or it's a moot point.”

People Ifs Knows Way Writing Stills Book Stories Wanted Enjoy Novel Crime Unusual Sequels Lingering Crime Novels

Author:Tod Goldberg

“Good writing, in my opinion, is writing that looks really easy, so easy that a person who has never written more than a grocery list might convince themself that they could also write a book. That being said, it's always a lot of work, as you know. And then there's this: you have no idea how many failed stories and novels I've attempted. I have files full of stories that didn't work for whatever reason.”

Knows Writing Looks Persons Said Book Ideas Reason Stories Might Easy Opinion Novel Written Lists No Idea Convince Now And Then Files Groceries Good Writing Grocery Lists

Author:Mary J. Miller

“I don't revise a lot when writing short stories. As far as the novel, I definitely thought more about plot. Honestly, I'm still pretty confused about what "plot" means. I've been reading some of my Goodreads reviews and one reader noted that the The Last Days of California "reads like a short story stretched to the breaking point, padded and brought into novel range..." I don't know what people want, really.”

“I can be really silly when I'm not actually writing silliness, and I have to rein that in. Pynchon, in my opinion, sometimes tells elaborate shaggy dog stories just to work up to a pun or punch line. My challenge is to use humor and wordplay to reinforce the emotional core of the novel.”

Writing I Can Sometimes Stories Use Challenges Lines Opinion Novel Dog Emotional Core Silly Reins Pun Wordplay Silliness

Author:Mary Kay Zuravleff

“If a novel or a story works, you don't stop thinking about it; it doesn't truly end.”

Ifs Thinking Ends Stories Novel

Author:Peter Orner

“The short story that eventually grew into Constellation was the first fiction set in Russia that I'd ever written, and that was right around the time I was giving up on a doomed, never-to-be-seen first novel. While I saw it could be something bigger, in hindsight fortuitous timing was as responsible as anything.”

Giving Firsts Stories Fiction Novel Saws Written Grew Giving Up Bigger Responsible Russia Short Story Timing Doomed Constellations Hindsight Fortuitous

Author:Anthony Marra

“The benefit of writing a collection - as opposed to a novel - is that I'm able to have some version of the war in each story without having to comment on its all-encompassing nature. Turn the page and here are new characters and new situations, but the war remains... Isn't that how life has been for us for over a decade?”

Writing Has Beens War Character Stories Able Turns Situation Novel Benefits Pages Remains Decades Versions Collections Comment New Situations

Author:Said Sayrafiezadeh

“Novels seem to exist because of this need to know and connect, and so story becomes charged with necessity.”

Knows Needs Stories Seems Novel

Author:Michael Helm

“I've been told by people who write historical novels that you just sort of write the emotional truth first, the story at the core, and then you go back and research it at the end.”

People Writing Firsts Ends Stories Novel Emotional Research Historical Core Historical Novels

Author:Jami Attenberg

“Simply put, you can read a story in a single sitting and hold it all in your mind. You can experience all of its rhythms, beginning to end, during that span. Consequently it has, I think, greater emotional power than a novel because of this real-time effect. Stories can stun you.”

Thinking Mind Real Ends Stories Novel Greater Effects Emotional Sitting Rhythm Emotional Power

Author:Adam Ross

“Even while I was working on the novel I would also write short stories as relief, just to be in a wieldier world that could negotiated more easily and more quickly. In the novel, I even changed the narrator from a man to a woman.”

Men World Writing Stories Novel Changed Relief Short Story Narrators

Author:Leni Zumas

“Radio, or at least the kind of radio we're proposing to do, can cut through that. It can reach people who would otherwise never hear your work, and of course I find that very notion inspiring. Radio stories are powerful because the human voice is powerful. It has been and will continue to be the most basic element of storytelling. As a novelist (and I should note that working my novel is the first thing I do in the morning and the very last thing I do before I sleep), shifting into this new medium is entirely logical. It's still narrative, only with different tools.”

“You want the greatest trick for writing a novel? Here it is: imagine urgently whispering your story into one person's ear - and only one. This one visualization will clarify every word choice you make.”

Want Writing Persons Stories Choices Novel Imagine Ears Tricks Whispering Visualization Choices You Make Word Choice

Author:Julianna Baggott

“Historical novels are about costumery. I think that's the magic and mystery of fiction. I don't want to write historical fiction but I do want the story to have the feel of history. There's a difference.”

Thinking Want Feels Writing Stories Differences Fiction Novel Magic Mystery Historical Historical Fiction Historical Novels

Author:Chang-Rae Lee

“That's how I work, whether with stories or novels - they start with an image that comes to me in a daydream, and a lot of times I'm walking around with these pictures in my head for awhile before I start writing.”

Writing Stories Novel Walking Daydreaming

Author:Dan Chaon

“I always worry that knowing too much about a novel or a story early on in writing will close it down - it feels fatalistic in some way.”

Way Feels Writing Stories Worry Novel Knowing Too Much Knowing Too Much

Author:Dan Chaon

“One easy mistake to make with the first novel is to expand the short story. Some things are better as a story; you cannot dilute things into a novel. I think the first hundred pages of a novel are very important. That's where you set things up: the world, the characters. Once you've set that up, it'll be much easier.”

Thinking World Firsts Important Character Stories Easy Mistake Novel Easier Pages Hundred Short Story

Author:Yiyun Li

“With a novel, you have to have a story. It's much more important to have it matter to the reader what happens to people, and it has to make sense and end in a way that is satisfying. So I spend a lot more time thinking about that. Then the writing itself usually is easier for me, because I know where it's going.”

People Thinking Knows Way Writing Important Ends Matter Stories Happens Novel Reader Easier Make Sense More Time Satisfying

Author:Dave Barry

“While I was drawn to the Renaissance, my first (unpublished) novels took place in modern times. When the subject of alchemy started creeping into my stories, an astute mentor observed that the bits about alchemy might fit better in another time frame. When I finally decided to weave the pieces about the medieval science into historical settings, a successful novel began to emerge. (And I dusted off that art history book, and put it to use once again.)”

“The historical novel gives us perspective on our modern lives and helps us connect with the story, which we are continuing ourselves.”

Giving Helping Stories Novel Modern Perspective Historical Continuing Modern Life Historical Novels

Author:Mary Pope Osborne

“It's really the story of a young woman, or two women, growing up in Naples in a poor neighborhood. The way that they get out of it - or don't get out of it - that's part of it. But it's also the story of the mid-20th century in Italy so it's really like a social, historical and personal novel. I think that even though I didn't live in Italy in those years, it did cover that same type of generational upbringing that someone like me might've had in America.”

“Movies, novels, TV shows - these are the water fountains of today. We thirst for stories which speak to us by representing us, but we go to the water fountains in the centre of town looking for that, and we're turned away, sent to the ghetto.”

Stories Shows Today Speak Water Novel Tvs Towns Thirst Tv Shows Centre Fountain Ghetto Representing Water Fountain

Author:Hal Duncan

“I'm always looking for context in which people tell stories. In "Fight Club" it's these support groups for dying people, and then in "Choke" it's 12-step recovery groups. In one novel it's artists' colonies, in another novel it's a diary form that submariners' wives typically keep so that when their husband comes back from serving on a submarine they have an accounting of their spouse's time. So I'm always looking for, number one, a non-fiction context - because you can tell a more outrageous story if you use a non-fiction form.”

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