Best stories & reader Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings

“What really grabs me is when a reader writes to express her personal story and how a book helped her situation, or her acceptance of a situation she can't change. I read some sad cases in my snail and electronic mail. I respond to all I can, affirming that they are the true heroes of life because they are fighting through adversity and surviving.”

Writing I Can Book Stories Fighting Situation Cases Acceptance Reader Hero Adversity Mail Surviving Can't Change Affirming Snail Personal Stories True Hero Fighting Through

Author:Lurlene McDaniel

“I feel like reading really defined me as a writer because I lived my life outside of my own body for so much of my life and I loved it. I've always been a reader. I think living all those stories served me to naturally take that next step to creating.”

Thinking Feels Stories Body Reading Next My Own Steps Reader Creating Defined Next Steps

Author:Stephenie Meyer

“I do have to earn a living, so I'm conscious of probable reactions from readers, but the most important one is still the awareness that if I'm not enjoying a story, the reader won't either.”

Ifs Stills Important Stories Enjoy Awareness Reader Conscious Reactions

Author:Thomas Perry

“Early on, a story's meaning and rationale seem pretty obvious, but then, as I write it, I realize that I know the meaning/rationale too well, which means that the reader will also know it - and so things have to be ramped up.”

Knows Writing Wells Mean Stories Seems Realizing Reader Obvious Rationale

Book:Tenth of December

Source: Tenth of December

“We wanted to describe society from our left point of view. Per had written political books, but they'd only sold 300 copies. We realised that people read crime and through the stories we could show the reader that under the official image of welfare-state Sweden there was another layer of poverty, criminality and brutality.”

People Book States Stories Shows Wanted Political Left Views Poverty Written Crime Reader Point Of View Welfare Officials Copies Layers Realised Brutality Sweden Welfare State Criminality

Author:Maj Sjowall

“A reader is not supposed to be aware that someone's written the story. He's supposed to be completely immersed, submerged in the environment.”

Stories Environment Written Reader Supposed To Be Submerged

Author:Jack Vance

“First person allows deeper insight into the protagonist's character. It allows the reader to identify more fully with the protagonist and to share her world quite intimately. So it suits a story focused on one character's personal journey. However, first person shuts out insights into other characters.”

World Firsts Persons Character Stories Journey Share Reader Deeper Insight Focused Suits First Person Protagonists Personal Journey

Author:Juliet Marillier

“I think that's a hallmark of a really good story that it has readers that it speaks to more than others.”

Thinking Stories Speak Reader Good Story Hallmark

Author:Erin Morgenstern

“Reading asks that you bring your whole life experience and your ability to decode the written word and your creative imagination to the page and be a co-author with the writer, because the story is just squiggles on the page unless you have a reader.”

Whole Stories Reading Asks Imagination Ability Creative Written Reader Pages Whole Life Life Experience Written Word Creative Imagination

Author:Katherine Paterson

“You find when you're writing a detective story that you're actually not trying to solve anything. You're trying to stop the reader from solving the puzzle.”

Writing Trying Stories Reader Solve Puzzles Detectives Detective Stories

Author:Christopher Bollen

“The word story is intended to alert the reader to the fact that, however closely the narrative may fit the facts, the fictional process has been at work.”

Writing May Has Beens Facts Stories Process Reader Fit Narrative

Book:Anatomy of Restlessness: Selected Writings 1969-1989

Source: Anatomy of Restlessness: Selected Writings 1969-1989

“What are the hallmarks of a competent writer of fiction? The first, it seems to me, is that he should be immensely interested in human beings, and have an eye sharp enough to see into them, and a hand clever enough to draw them as they are. The second is that he should be able to set them in imaginary situations which display the contents of their psyches effectively, and so carry his reader swiftly and pleasantly from point to point of what is called a good story.”

Should Firsts Humans Enough Stories Hands Seems Eye Able Human Beings Fiction Situation Reader Draws Clever Display Imaginary Competent Good Story Hallmark Psych

Author:H. L. Mencken

“GraceQuest is a gripping story of one man's (and his family's) struggle with tremendous weakness and pain, but it is also a narrative theodicy--defense of God's goodness in spite of the undeniable reality of evil. . . . This is an honest and hard-hitting book about God's grace in and through tremendous loss of health and strength. Readers will find hope and help here if they are open to its message about the God-given 'strength to suffer well.'”

“I think a good writer is a mix of confidence (sure that what they're writing is going to appeal to their readers) and uncertainty (what if all these words are crap?). If you're too confident, you get an attitude that seeps through into your writing, affecting the characters and the story. If you're too uncertain, you'll never finish anything.”

Ifs Thinking Writing Character Stories Attitude Reader Appeals Uncertainty What If Crap Uncertain Good Writers

Author:Charles de Lint

“The only real reason for self-referencing is the fun factor. It's fun for the writer, getting little peeks at what old characters might be up to. And it's fun for readers to spot a familiar face, or pick up on a made-up book title or something from an earlier story. I don't know that it does -- or even should -- contribute to the story in hand being any better than it would have been without it.”

Knows Should Littles Doe Has Beens Made Book Real Self Reason Character Stories Hands Might Faces Fun Reader Picks Familiar Factors Spots Titles Referencing Familiar Faces Book Titles

Author:Charles de Lint

“I try to keep deep love out of my stories because, once that particular subject comes up, it is almost impossible to talk about anything else. Readers don't want to hear about anything else. They go gaga about love. If a lover in a story wins his true love, that's the end of the tale, even if World War III is about to begin, and the sky is black with flying saucers.”

Source: Conversations with Kurt Vonnegut

“There are all sorts of theories and ideas about what constitutes a good opening line. It's tricky thing, and tough to talk about because I don't think conceptually while I work on a first draft -- I just write. To get scientific about it is a little like trying to catch moonbeams in a jar. But there's one thing I'm sure about. An opening line should invite the reader to begin the story. It should say: Listen. Come in here. You want to know about this.”

Thinking Knows Want Should Writing Trying Firsts Littles Ideas Stories Lines One Thing Theory Reader Tough Opening Invites Tricky Jars Moonbeams

Author:Stephen King

“At some point, every science fiction and fantasy story must challenge the reader's experience and learning. That's much of the reason why the genre is so open to experimentation and innovation that other genres reject--strangeness is our bread and butter. Spread it thick or slice it thin, it's still our staff of life.”

Source: The Writer's Digest Guide to Science Fiction & Fantasy

“Reflecting on these complex relationships between reader and story, fiction and life, can constitute a form of therapy against the sleep of reason, which generates monsters.”

Reason Stories Form Sleep Fiction Reader Complexes Monsters Therapy Reflecting Complex Relationships

Book:Six Walks in the Fictional Woods

Source: Six Walks in the Fictional Woods

“I don't want to write things that people don't want to read. I would have no pleasure in producing something that sold 600 copies but that was considered very wonderful. I would prefer to sell 20,000 copies because the readers loved it. When I write books I don't actually think about the market in that way. I just tell myself the story. I don't think I'm talking to a 10-year-old boy or a six-year-old girl. I just write on the level the story seems to call for.”

People Thinking Way Want Writing Years Book Stories Seems Girl Pleasure Levels Talking Boys Wonderful Reader Six Sells Copies Six Year Olds

Author:Emily Rodda

“This book reminds me of James Gleick's Chaos. The ideas and stories in Loving and Hating Mathematics are timely, interesting, and sometimes even profound. The authors, writing for nonspecialists, take pains to explain technical ideas in nontechnical language, and the book should interest general readers as well as a large mathematical audience.”

Should Writing Wells Book Ideas Sometimes Stories Pain Hate Language Interest Interesting Audience Reader Mathematics Profound Chaos Mathematical Timely

Author:Steven G. Krantz

“Nothing requires so little mental effort as to narrate or follow a story. Hence everybody tells stories and the readers of stories outnumber all others.”

Littles Stories Effort Reader

Book:Aphorisms and Reflections: Conduct, Culture and Religion

Source: Aphorisms and Reflections: Conduct, Culture and Religion

“Something about the possession of a book - an object that can contain infinite fables, words of wisdom, chronicles of times gone by, humorous anecdotes and divine revelation - endows the reader with the power of creating a story, and the listener with a sense of being present at the moment of creation.”

“As readers, we want not only a strong story, but also characters we can relate to, characters that feel real. We have to find something of ourselves in them. Each character, even those only there to serve the mechanics of the plot, should have a number of layers. The entire world you are stepping into as a reader must feel real. It must have resonance, you must be able to touch the light; smell the smells.”

World Want Feels Should Real Character Stories Light Able Strong Numbers Reader Should Have Smell Relate Plot Layers Mechanic Resonance

Author:Carlos Ruiz Zafon

“A ghost story of which the scene is laid in the twelfth or thirteenth century may succeed in being romantic or poetical: it will never put the reader into the position of saying to himself: "If I'm not careful, something of this kind may happen to me!”

Ifs Kind May Stories Happens Century Position Reader Scene Succeed Careful Ghost Ghost Stories

Book:Casting the Runes and Other Ghost Stories

Source: Casting the Runes and Other Ghost Stories

“One of the greatest sins in any story is false suspense. The kind of 'suspense' that disintegrates the moment you give your reader one second to think about it. And it's an easy trap to fall into, so watch carefully for it. If your story hinges on the question, 'Will Superman be pushed so far in his battle against Lex Luthor that he'll have to kill him?', or if your big cliffhanger moment is, 'Wow, is Spider-Man really dead this time?', then I understand Food Lion is hiring.”

Ifs Thinking Men Giving Kind Book Moments Stories Bigs Fall Easy Sin Watches Reader Battle Comic Suspense Lions Wow Traps Comic Book Spiders Hiring Hinges Spider Man Cliffhanger

Author:Mark Waid

“There really is no difference in the actual writing or plotting. I choose to tell different stories for the younger reader and, of course, I would never put sex and extreme violence in a YA book. But writing for adults and children requires the same care and attention.”

Writing Children Book Different Stories Care Courses Sex Differences Attention Violence Reader Adults Extremes

Author:Michael Scott

“Are You Seeing Me? is written powerfully with both the heart and the head, and neither gives an inch. It's funny, moving and hugely insightful. Darren Groth puts the reader into the heads of Perry and Justine in a way that feels so true and so revealing that I think I've come away with a greater capacity for empathy. I didn't know a book could do that. We all need to spend some time inside this story.”

Thinking Knows Way Needs Giving Feels Heart Book Stories Moving Greater Written Seeing Reader Empathy Capacity Insightful Inches Revealing Darren Justine

Author:Nick Earls

“A good story is alive, ever changing and growing as it meets each listener or reader in a spirited and unique encounter, while the moralistic tale is not only dead on arrival, it's already been embalmed. It's safer that way. When a lively story goes dancing out to meet the imagination of a child, the teller loses control over meaning. The child gets to decide what the story means.”

Way Mean Children Stories Literature Loses Imagination Alive Growing Reader Unique Dancing Tales Encounters Listeners Good Story Lively Arrivals Spirited Children's Literature

Author:Katherine Paterson

“I am called to listen to the sound of my own heart -- to write the story within myself that demands to be told at that particular point in my life. And if I do this faithfully, clothing that idea in the flesh of human experience and setting it in a true place, the sound from my heart will resound in the reader's heart.”

Ifs Writing Humans Heart Ideas Stories Sound My Own Particular Reader My Heart Demand Flesh Setting Settings Clothings Human Experience

Author:Katherine Paterson

“Story involves action. Action towards an end not to be foreseen (by the reader) but also towards an end which, having been reached, must be seen to have been from the start inevitable.”

Has Beens Ends Stories Action Reader Inevitable Foreseen

Book:Collected Impressions

Source: Collected Impressions

“Are my characters copies of people in real life? ... Don't ever believe the stories about authors putting people into novels. That idea is a kind of joke on both authors and readers. All the readers believe that authors do it. All the authors know that it can't be done.”

People Knows Believe Kind Ideas Real Done Character Stories Novel Reader Jokes Real Life Copies

Book:Letters of Ayn Rand

Source: Letters of Ayn Rand

“I've always thought that one of the things that the Internet and the gaming world permits as a narrative technique is to not tell the story from beginning to end - to tell stories sideways, to give alternative possibilities that the reader can, in a way, choose between.”

World Way Giving Ends Stories Possibility Reader Internet Technique Alternatives Narrative Permit Gaming Sideways

Author:Salman Rushdie

“Many readers share their stories with me and if one speaks to me (or if the same theme keeps coming at me), I will research it and decide if it would make a good book. But, straight down to it, people inspire me.”

People Ifs Book Stories Speak Share Inspire Reader Research Theme Good Book

Author:Ellen Hopkins

“in reading ... stories, you can be many different people in many different places, doing things you would never have a chance to do in ordinary life. It's amazing that those twenty-six little marks of the alphabet can arrange themselves on the pages of a book and accomplish all that. Readers are lucky - they will never be bored or lonely.”

“my crime books are actually novels and are written as such. One might even say that each one is really two novels, one of which is the story I tell the reader, and the other the buried story I know and let slip now and then into a clue to whet the reader's interest.”

Knows Two Book Stories Might Interest Novel Written Mystery Crime Reader Buried Slips Now And Then Clue Mystery Novels Crime Books

Book:The Mary Roberts Rinehart crime book

Source: The Mary Roberts Rinehart crime book

“I remember my fourth grade teacher reading 'Charlotte's Web' and 'Stuart Little' to us - both, of course, by E. B. White. His stories were genuinely funny, thought provoking and full of irony and charm. He didn't condescend to his readers, which was why I liked his books, and why I wasn't a big reader of other children's' books.”

“I think you tell the story that has to be told. You tell the story that's the truth. You tell the story that readers will be interested in and should know about.”

Thinking Knows Should Stories Reader

Author:Andrew Ross Sorkin

“Kerry Cohen's powerful, transfixing story will be familiar to many women, most of whom won't want to admit it. In this heartfelt and authentic memoir, Cohen transcends the pain and shame of a promiscuous past, and leaves readers with a sense of hope and triumph.”

Want Stories Pain Past Powerful Reader Shame Memoir Familiar Triumph Heartfelt Promiscuous

Author:Janice Erlbaum

“I read The Conspiracy Against the Human Race and found it incredibly powerful writing. For me as a reader, it was less impactful as philosophy than as one writers ultimate confessional: an absolute horror story, where the self is the monster.”

Writing Humans Self Philosophy Stories Found Powerful Race Reader Horror Ultimate Absolutes Monsters Human Race Conspiracy Horror Stories

Author:Nic Pizzolatto

“As a reader, coming to my reading as a writer immersed in fairytales, I cant help but notice in so many stories, plays, poems that I read, the sort of breadcrumbs of fairytale techniques, so Im very excited when I notice that.”

Play Helping Stories Reading Reader Excited Technique Cant Fairytale

Author:Kate Bernheimer

“To what or whom does Lizzie Harris direct the imperative title of her startling first book, Stop Wanting? To the reader, the narrator, to desire itself, or to lack? This is a work of complexly, ambiguously layered narratives and identities. The opening poem asserts I want to say what happened / but am suspicious of stories. These lines become an ars poetica for the whole of this painful and exceptional collection in which the unspeakable is stubbornly confronted by a searing eloquence. This is a commanding debut.”

“Every time I start off a book or a story I feel like I'm developing a new style or approach for that individual story alone, and it sometimes feels as if readers are looking for the same style/approach from the same writer over and over again, which hasn't helped me in the publishing biz.”

Ifs Feels Book Sometimes Stories Individual Style Reader Approach Developing Publishing

Author:Scott Bradfield

“I try very hard to tell stories and not lecture. I try to approach things as an amateur and not an expert, so that when I'm doing something, I'm starting out in a place a lot like where my readers start out - which is to say, naïve.”

Trying Hard Stories Reader Approach Starting Experts Lectures Starting Out

Author:Michael Pollan

“On a more technical level, a story takes a lot of words. And to generate words and phrases and images and so on, that will compel the reader to continue reading - that stand a chance of really grabbing a reader - the writer has to work out of a place of, let's say, familiarity and affection. The matrix of the story has to be made out of stuff the writer really knows about and likes. The writer can't be stretching and (purely) inventing all the time. Well, I can't, anyway.”

Knows Wells Made I Can Stories Reading Stuff Chance Levels Reader Affection Work Out Likes Phrases Familiarity Stretching Inventing Grabbing

Author:George Saunders

“The only place where you can really surprise or shock the reader, or make someone laugh, is on the lower righthand corner - the very last panel - so as you turn the page, the payoff is in the upper lefthand panel. To pace every story so that there's a setup and a payoff at the page turn was a huge challenge; it's a part of the medium and you really have to learn what can be done in the medium.”

Done Stories Lasts Turns Challenges Laughing Huge Reader Pages Surprise Corners Mediums Shock Pace Payoff Setups Make Someone Laugh

Author:Chuck Palahniuk

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