Quotes About Writing

It took me eight books to finally be at a point in my career where I could come out with a book and say, 'This is meant to be a funny book,' and we didn't have to make any bones about it.

I feel it in my bones that if I had a kid, I would not either continue to write or have written the book I have done. So it's just me and the dog. I've always gotten along better with animals than I have with children, anyway.

Never index your own book.

When I started earning money from screen-writing, for a long time my only indulgences were books.

I'm just going to write whatever I'm going to write, and whatever shelf or section they end up on at the bookstore is just going to be that, and I'll let the marketing people pull their hair out and worry about it.

After a while, if you're a writer, you want to start appearing in the bookstores of the place you're living in.

The biggest risk with a series that goes on this long is that you'll get bored with the character.

I write when I get bored, when I have nothing to do.

Writing bores me so.

Read every sentence you write out loud. If it sounds boring, kill it.

I believe that one reason I began writing essays - a form without a form, until you make it - was this: you didn't have to borrow from an emotionally and visually upsetting past, as one did in fiction, apparently, to write your story.

I don't read much of what I write because I worry about unintentionally borrowing something.

The writer's room is super-chill - Donald, of course being my brother, helps. My boss is my brother, in a way; we can talk on a regular level.

I have a great many shortcomings, but writing for something on time has never bothered me.

I never know how a novel is going to end, because you don't really know what's going to be at the bottom of a novel until you excavate it.

No one bought my screenplays.

I like to work with co-writers because I think it's really fun to bounce ideas off each other.

Especially in the last 10 years, the writing on animated shows has jumped by leaps and bounds.

When I have a lot of emotion going on, I'll write. I write letters to my family, my boyfriend, anyone I'm trying to get my point across to. It's easier for me to express myself.

Whenever I write a story, I hope it appeals to both boys and girls.

I'm astounded by people who can listen to music when they write. I can only assume that they have multi-track brains, while mine is decidedly single.

You have to be very brave in that first writing session.

I don't have anything to prove as a writer anymore. I write about Panera Bread or Red Lobster or Satan or Richard Ramirez or whatever comes to mind. I just write.

Sometimes a manuscript is like bread dough. You have to abuse it.