Quotes from Marisha Pessl

When I'm creating characters, I definitely think of theme songs. Writing for me is very visual, so I sometimes think of it in terms of a movie with a soundtrack, and try to transfer that to words.

What you tend to find in the personal lives of brilliant men is devastation akin to a nuclear bomb going off.

Justice wields an erratic sword, grants mercy to fortunate few. Yet if man doesn't fight for her, 'tis chaos he's left to.

Show me what a man hates and I'll show you what he is.

For every man there exists bait he cannot resist swallowing.

God, the boring relative everyone ignores--no one calls, no one writes--until they need a serious favor.

Good bands you can kind of lose, then come back and realize they're still good.

Happiness is a hound dog in the sun. We aren't on Earth to be happy, but to experience incredible things. - Hannah Schneider

I believe writers need to be chameleons, or like Meryl Streep, who can play all sorts of characters. A good writer should be able to cross gender lines and people of all social classes. So for me, writing from a male point of view would be a great challenge, that I would look forward to taking on.

I hate to think of a day where a compelling book or a compelling authorial voice would be lost simply because that person doesn't have a Web site. But I think that, to use the Internet in a positive way, to turn people on to reading, is something that authors shouldn't really shy away from necessarily.

Sometimes it takes more courage not to let yourself see. Sometimes knowledge is damaging - not enlightenment but enleadenment.

He said you couldn't pretend the terrible things in life didn't happen. You can't clean it up. You keep all the refuse and the scars. It's how you learn. And try to make improvements.

People don't realize how easy life is to change. You just get on the bus.

It's funny how the night that changes your life forever starts out like all the others.

Always live your life with your biography in mind," Dad was fond of saying. "Naturally, it won't be published unless you have a Magnificent Reason, but at the very least you will be living grandly.

Life was a freight train barreling toward just one stop, our loved ones streaking past our windows in blurs of color and light. There was no holding on to any of it, and no slowing it down.

It's easy to be yourself in the dark.

You journalists bulldoze life's mysteries, ignorant of what you're so ruthlessly turning up.

What you tend to find in the personal lives of brilliant men is devastation akin to a nuclear bomb going off.

Look at Picasso. O'Neill. Tennessee Williams. Capote. Were these shiny happy people spreading sunshine? No. Only the greatest of personal demons can force you to do powerful work.

To be sensitive is fine, but it makes day-to-day living- life -rather painful.

For every man there exists bait he cannot resist swallowing.

Happiness is a hound dog in the sun. We aren't on Earth to be happy, but to experience incredible things. - Hannah Schneider

It's funny how the night that changes your life forever starts out like all the others.