“People really want to believe that there is no fiction. I think they find it much easier to imagine that novelists are writing memoirs, writing about their lives, because it's difficult to conceive that there's a great imaginary life in which you can participate.” PeopleThinkingWantWritingBelieveDifficultFictionImagineEasierMemoirNovelistsImaginaryImagine ThatImaginary Life Author:Mark Leyner
“Obviously any fiction is going to be a combination of what is invented, what is overheard, what is experienced, what is experienced by people close to you, what you are told, what you have read, all mixed together into this kind of soup which, like any good soup, at the end you cannot really distinguish the ingredients.” PeopleKindEndsTogetherFictionCombinationIngredientsSoup Author:David Leavitt
“I'm not writing great literature. I'm writing commercial fiction for people to enjoy the stories and to like the characters.” PeopleWritingCharacterStoriesLiteratureEnjoyFictionGreat Literature Author:Kathy Reichs
“I'm able to separate fiction and reality. I guess it remains to be seen if other people are.” PeopleIfsRealityAbleFictionRemainsFiction And Reality Author:Curtis Sittenfeld
“I finally decided one day, reading science fiction magazines of the time, I could do at least as well as some of these people are doing. So I finally made a serious effort.” PeopleWellsMadeReadingLiteratureEffortFictionSeriousOne DayDecidedScience FictionMagazines Author:Fred Saberhagen
“There's a big overlap with the people you meet at the fantasy and science fiction cons.” PeopleBigsFictionFantasyScience Fiction Author:Fred Saberhagen
“The best thing about writing fiction is that moment where the story catches fire and comes to life on the page, and suddenly it all makes sense and you know what it's about and why you're doing it and what these people are saying and doing, and you get to feel like both the creator and the audience. Everything is suddenly both obvious and surprising ("but of course that's why he was doing that, and that means that...") and it's magic and wonderful and strange.” PeopleKnowsFeelsWritingMeanMomentsStoriesCoursesFictionAudienceFireWonderfulMagicStrangePagesObviousCreatorMake SenseBest ThingsThat MomentSurprisingWriting FictionSaying And Doing Author:Neil Gaiman
“The interesting thing about fiction from a writer's standpoint is that the characters come to life within you. And yet who are they and where are they? They seem to have as much or more vitality and complexity as the people around you.” PeopleCharacterSeemsInterestingFictionComplexityWithin YouVitalityInteresting ThingsStandpoint Author:Whitley Strieber
“Fiction just has a lot more room for ambivalence and internal conflict, contradiction, and for me that sums up so much of what people felt after 9/11 - confusion even. And I think that's hard to capture in journalism.” PeopleThinkingHardFeltRoomsFictionConflictConfusionJournalismContradictionInternalsCaptureAmbivalenceInternal Conflict Author:Amy Waldman
“History is the history of human behavior, and human behavior is the raw material of fiction. Most people recognize that novelists do research to get the facts right - how a glove factory works, for example, or how courtesans in imperial Japan dressed.” PeopleHumansFactsFictionExampleMaterialsBehaviorResearchNovelistsJapanFactoriesHuman BehaviorGlovesRaw MaterialsCourtesans Author:Amy Waldman
“I have no idea what my draw is for science fiction. I hope they come to me because they like complicated women. But I've never played the Bionic Woman. In 'Sarah Connor' and 'Lost,' I am not the orchestrator of what happens. I've played quite peripheral people.” PeopleIdeasHappensLostFictionDrawsScience FictionComplicatedNo IdeaBionics Author:Sonya Walger