Quotes About Author

Historical fiction of course is particularly research-heavy. The details of everyday life are there to trip you up. Things that we take for granted, indeed, hardly think about, can lead to tremendous mistakes.

Writing about the 1950s has given me tremendous respect for my mother's generation.

I'm a professional writer and I consider it part of my job to publicise my work and these days part of that job is done online.

People who inspire such contradictory emotions must be worthwhile, I reasoned.

I have a really vivid imagination and I find it difficult to read scenes of complete graphic violence. That's not to say that graphic violence does not exist. It's just that I find it quite harrowing and I much prefer if it isn't completely outlined for me because my imagination can do that.

Having instant feedback on twitter to research material I'm considering is an enormous help.

I believe that being able to communicate directly with readers is a boon. I certainly enjoy it as much as they do.

I've always had a keen sense of history. My father was an antiques dealer and he used to bring home boxes full of treasures, and each item always had a tale attached.

Archive material is vital to the writer of historical fiction.

Small details are a vital part of allowing a reader to make an imaginative connection with long dead historical figures.

I am completely unflustered by whichever medium people choose to read my words. I'm just delighted they're reading them at all!

Most fellas like the races, though, Miss. It's only human nature

I am a storyteller, not a historian, and it's my ambition to create something compelling - something unputdownable and riveting - that chimes with the real history but is, in fact, fiction.

Writing is such a solitary occupation that it takes a long time to build up a group of professional peers with whom you genuinely identify.

The sound of pencils taking notes provided a low scrape and hum, almost like radio interference.

Cases fired by emotion rather than money were dangerous.

I remember calling the council's cemetery department to ask about body decomposition in different soil types. Once they had verified that I was a novelist and not a sicko, they were extremely helpful.

I've been obsessed with stories since I was a kid so it's no surprise that I ended up writing for a living.

Forbidden zones were familiar to the point of institutionalisation in the Soviet System, but more than forty 'sensitive' cities remain shut off.

The Bible-as-story works. It works in all the ways that story itself works: in offering transcendence, identity, intimacy, timelessness, wonder, and so forth

For me, reason is the natural organ of truth; but imagination is the organ of meaning."16

Truth is the aim of story. And though we must take into account the human author's subjectivity and personal slant, the best authors are those who tap universal longings and make connections to our real, lived humanity.

In the end, there is a normative story that we live into as a church: the story God is telling through scripture, as summarized in the words of the creed. And

confirmation is one of the most important and serendipitous storytelling opportunities we in youth ministry will ever have.