Quotes from Patrick Ness

Shout for libraries. Shout for the young readers who use them.

Libraries are not facing crisis, they are in crisis.

But what is a dream, Conor O'Malley? Who is to say that it is not everything else that is the dream?

I was a hugely unchaperoned reader, and I would wander into my local public library and there sat the world, waiting for me to look at it, to find out about it, to discover who I might be insid

A good idea always attracts other good ideas.

The world is cynical and sarcastic, but that doesn't mean that that's always the truth.

There's a bunch od huge churchs clustered together, trying to blend in with all the family-themed restaurants, because salvation is as easy as chicken wings, I guess.

That's what librarians do. They open up the world. Because knowledge is useless if you don't know how to find it, if you don't even know where to begin to look.

And it's a sad song, Todd, but it's also a promise. I'll never deceive you and I'll never leave you and I promise you this so you can one day promise it to others and know that it's true.

We can save the world," I say, trying to smile. "You and me.

Happiness is precious, and so I prefer to keep mine private. In a world where everyone shares everything, I can think of a lot of happy moments, but they're mine.

Whenever I have tried to write for other people, that's when my writing has failed, when nobody wanted to read it or buy it. But it's only when I've been able to write a story that makes me excited, only then have other people wanted to read it.

Your reader is interested in a guileless, fresh, first-time-we-talked-about-it way. What a great liberation that is. And teenagers, if you respect them, will follow you a lot further than adults will, without fear of being a genre that they may not like or have been told not to like. They just want a story.

I like writing for teenagers because they're not snobs.

I think the reason teenage fiction is so popular with adults is that adults hunger for narrative just as badly as teenagers do.

Schooling ain't life." "Ain't it?" she says, her eyebrows raising in mock surprise.

Forget market or publishers or whatever. Just write with fire and joy, and in my own experience, those are the stories of mine people have wanted to read.

I don't purposely push the boundaries... I think if you pay attention to a story, it will have exactly as much 'difficult material' as it needs, and nobody will complain about it because you've earnt it.

Do we hate paradise so much we need to make sure it becomes a trash heap?

If you sing beautifully about nothing, no one will listen. If you sing badly about great stuff, no one will listen. Ideas are everywhere, but my theory is that a writer doesn't just think of an idea: they perform them.

Viola? Keep calling for me– And I'll keep searching for you– And I'll find you– You bet yer life on it– I'll find you– Keep calling for me, Viola– Cuz here I come.

Don't think you haven't lived long enough to have a story to tell.

No one escapes from a war. No one. Not even the survivors. You accept things that would appall you at any other time because life has temporarily lost all meaning.

Life ain't fair. It ain't. Not never.