reading

Sometimes it is the reader that sucks, not the book.

What is it about us lady authors and our fascination for the exclamation mark?

I am forever an advocate of books, both the reading of them and the writing. There is something sacred to me in that community. Because writing--and reading--is a solitary business. And it__ good to know I__ not alone.

I'm not interested in the reviews by critics over the age of 15.

My only wish is to be buried with my books.

People disappear when they die. Their voice, their laughter, the warmth of their breath. Their flesh. Eventually their bones. All living memory of them ceases. This is both dreadful and natural. Yet for some there is an exception to this annihilation. For in the books they write they continue to exist.

A book is a place where my reality, escapism, hope, despair, love and death lie.

If you write without reading, you will certainly have too many books without readers.

I propose that every person out of work be required to submit a book report before he or she gets his or her welfare check.

I read daily, not so much for the benefit of my writing, but because I am addicted to it. There is nothing in the world for me that compares to being lost in a really good novel. That said, reading is an absolute must if you want to write. It is a trite enough thing to say, but very true nonetheless. I cannot understand aspiring writers who email me for advice and freely admit that they read very little. I have learned something from every writer I have ever read. Sometimes I have done so consciously, picking up something about how to frame a scene, or seeing a new possibility with regards to structure, or interesting ways to write dialogue. Other times, I think, my collective reading experience affects my sensibilities and informs me in ways that I am not quite aware of, but in real ways that impact how I approach writing. The short of it is, as an aspiring writer, there is nothing as damaging to your credibility as saying that you don__ like to read

When my father first took me to Ennis Library I went down among the shelves and felt company, not only the company of writers, but the readers too, because they had lifted and opened and read these books. The books were worn in a way they can only get worn by hands and eyes and minds

I swooned again _ I had that moment of falling in love with reading again.

Literature is language charged with meaning

I don't need to write a memoir of my life. All you need to do is read one of my books. I'm there.

Where do you get your ideas?' people are always asking authors they admire, which I__e always thought was another way of asking, 'How did you get my ideas, which I didn__ know I had until you put words to them?' We are known, appreciated, even cherished by our favorite writers; every word of our favorite books seems to have been written for us. Within their sentences and paragraphs, those writers are forever available, forever patient, including us in their compassionate recognition of the impossible, exhausting complexity of being human (those __any thousand_ selves), never ignoring us or abandoning us or finding us dull. It__ you, they whisper, as we turn their pages, you are the one I__e been waiting to tell everything to.

Readers are the glue that binds the books together.

The pen, a double-edged mystery: cuts the writer, heals the reader.

The average buyer in bookshop spends 8 seconds on the front cover and 15 seconds on the back cover before deciding whether to purchase the book or not. On average, he does not get past page 18. See? The odds are stacked against us writers!