Quotes About Literature

My grandmother had a couple of strange books published by the Woolfs. I didn't know her - she was dead by the time I was born. But I knew my grandfather. He was lovely.

A very important part of writing for children is appearing at book festivals, and in libraries and schools. An important part of becoming a writer for children is seeing what published writers do and say when they appear.

Mark Haddon's 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time' was published while I was trying to work out how to write 'Elizabeth Is Missing,' and reading the story of that impaired amateur detective gave me the licence I needed to attempt one of my own.

Getting your work published is a major struggle.

No, my publisher has always done the marketing.

I got into an argument with my original publisher. They wanted me to do 'Kitty' and nothing else. I wanted to do lots of things, not just 'Kitty' books.

I remember a period where my publisher said to me, 'Look, your historical work is selling much better than your contemporary work, so please give us more historicals.'

I had no idea I'd end up writing four books when I completed 'Mortal Engines.' I didn't even think it would find a publisher.

Hugh Howey and Amanda Hocking come to mind immediately as authors who managed to build a successful following without the initial support of a large publisher.

I think that a really good agent should be able to get the right publisher, which the agent has already figured out, get as much money as she can from that publisher, and make a deal, rather than have the amount of money determine the sale. That's what the best agents do.

An e-book distributor is not a publisher, but rather a purveyor of work that has already been created.

My publisher's been shipping me to comic-cons, and it seems that my readership overlaps perfectly with the comic-con crowd.

Maybe just as many women writers as male writers could be billed as the next great American writer by their publisher. Maybe book criticism sections could review an equal amount of female and male writers. Maybe Oprah could start putting some books by women authors in her book club, since most of her audience is women.

Most people do not pay attention to the publisher's imprint on a given book.

Just because we're Knopf doesn't mean we shouldn't sell books as well as any other publisher in the land.

It's always hard to write and get your words out there, to find an editor, a publisher - readers! - who are going to appreciate them.

I think it would be a shame for any writer to let their publishers in any way corral them into a single genre.

I'm not a great shopper but I do buy a lot of books. I'm the publishers' friend - I buy a hundred books a year and read four.

Now that I'm being very successful, publishers are trying to mainstream me, but I'm unabashedly genre. It's what I like to read, what I like to write.

You know, it's sort of common wisdom among New York publishers that short story collections don't make money.

I try to keep all my novels in print. Sometimes publishers don't agree with me as to their worth.

Just why I sent it to the publishers would be hard to say, but when I had finished it I felt that it was literature, because it is real and because it was well written. And I know that the world wants such things.

When I started, there were no big interviews, no television, no profiles and all that. The publishers were quite shockingly uncommercial, but they did look after their writers.

My first two books did nada. I ended up paying the publishers.