Michelle Paver Quotes

All fantasy should have a solid base in reality.

Nonfiction is both easier and harder to write than fiction. It's easier because the facts are already laid out before you, and there is already a narrative arc. What makes it harder is that you are not free to use your imagination and creativity to fill in any missing gaps within the story.

How much research I have to do depends on the nature of the story. For fantasy, none at all.

While novels are fiction, mine are usually very close to my heart. Like my other books, 'The Lemon Orchard' is inspired by something I care about. I care so deeply. The stories are my dreams, and I want to do a lot of research. Roberto is based on a real live friend of mine named Armando who worked in my garden.

I think I have a God complex, and I like moving mountains and writing stories that affect entire worlds, and it's a bit hard to do that in a contemporary setting because you have reality intruding. Whereas, when you set your own reality, you can make up your own rules and do whatever you like.

I'm an escapist kind of writer.

You can't write about fantasy without being ridiculous.

For a novelist, the great thing about the Stone Age people is that we know virtually nothing about their beliefs - which means that I get to make it up! But it's still got to be plausible.

I don't feel there's any reason to apologise for having a wicked imagination. I think it's important as a maker of fantasy and of horror.

I have to do more close research and fact checking for the science fiction. This is not however to say that writing good fantasy does not involve doing good research.

I'd always had a hankering to write some old-school sword and sorcery. And there certainly are advantages to that particular form - for one thing, you're able to go all-out on the imaginative front, with a lot less concern for the usual unities of time and space and character.

My first two novels were set in the past, and that freed me up in a lot of ways; it allowed me to find my way into my story and my characters through research.

Fantasy is totally wide open; all you really have to do is follow the rules you've set. But if you're writing about science, you have to first learn what you're writing about.

Research can be a boon to a novelist - there are more things in heaven and Earth than can be dreamt of in a single writer's philosophy - or it can become a hindrance, a thick layer of algae that weighs down the storytelling.

You have so many sources to draw on when you're a fantasy writer.

There is a rule for fantasy writers: The more truth you mix in with a lie, the stronger it gets.

I always have a rough outline, but I'm shocked at how little I actually follow it. Those characters keep doing things that I never expected. I think if I crept up to my keyboard and peeked, they'd be talking about things behind my back. Okay, that's a little paranoid and delusional... but just a little.

You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children.

I throw everything I have into whatever story I'm writing - and so there's something immensely gratifying about finishing one piece and then starting fresh with a new setting, time period and cast of characters, getting to see the world through a completely different lens each time.

I prefer writing originals.

My feeling is that writing Fantasy should be harder - not easier - than writing any other kind of fiction.

I think one of the keys to better writing is releasing all of your ideas and to not be afraid. Dream big. This could be the greatest novel in the world you know.

I think that my passion for writing fantasy began at about the same time as my passion for reading fantasy.

The real world is the fantasy writer's scrapbook. Real history, real geography, real customs and religions are all invaluable sources of guidance and inspiration.

I have no plans for a future Jemima Shore mystery, but would write one tomorrow if a good idea came to me.