Holly Lisle Quotes

I really absolutely loved writing my first book.

From the moment I wrote 'Leaf Storm' I realized I wanted to be a writer and that nobody could stop me and that the only thing left for me to do was to try to be the best writer in the world.

Thirteen years I took on this last book.

The story wrote quickly. I called it 'Where You're From,' and I sent it out, as I had numerous other stories over the years. Except this time I got a letter back saying that it would be published. Someone out there had liked the story. I was thirty-one years old.

My first novel was a challenge to myself. No one had an inkling that I was working on it.

I now can be sure that, once I start writing a book, I'll be able to finish it. I've also become more assured about my 'voice' as a writer and being able to keep the characters true to themselves.

I used to think that when I finished a book, I was finished with it. But it's like a wonderful Hydra. Every time a head disappears, more heads appear, so I will be writing for the rest of my life. The more books I write, the more books I find that I still have to write about. I use it like an inspiration, and that's wonderful.

'Made it as a writer'? I'm still wondering if I've made it as a writer. I've made it as a published writer of the type of SF that I want to write and read, but I'm still waiting for that big breakthrough.

The best novel I wrote was one called 'Crusoe's Daughter,' which never won any prizes. But I was getting somewhere in that. I'm not sure I have in any of the others.

Writing my first book, I think in hindsight I went into it saying, 'It's gonna sell.' I was earning enough to scrape by sometime around a book or two before 'Tell No One.' I moved up from $50,000 to $75,000, then $150,000 for each book. I had never thought I would be doing anything else. I had enough encouragement.

The difference between people who believe they have books inside of them and those who actually write books is sheer cussed persistence - the ability to make yourself work at your craft, every day - the belief, even in the face of obstacles, that you've got something worth saying.

I'd like to meet fewer people who say 'Oh, I want to write a book, here are 10 pages I've written,' and more 'Oh, I want to write a book, here are 300 pages I've written.'

When I started working on 'Stay With Me,' I thought it would take two years to complete the novel.

'I Drink' took me two years to write.

And now, I'm a best selling author, a different sort of fairy tale that I still sometimes wonder when I'll wake up from.

Getting a book published made me feel a little bit sad. I felt driven by the need to write a book, rather than the need to write. I needed to figure out what was important to me as a writer.

The first thing you have to understand is that I was not desperate to be a writer. I was never a closet writer filing away notes in a cupboard.

When you are writing a book, it feels as if you are simply concentrating on the world of the book and that whatever is happening in your personal life is outside the room, as it were. But maybe that's just the way you have to talk to yourself to make it possible.

I really only have been seriously writing, finishing things and publishing things since January '91.

I wish I could spend six years writing one novel.

I wrote my first book at 20, but my whole focus from about the age of 12 was to be a writer.

Publishing a novel was such a proud thing for me. When I was a kid, I used to say to my mum and dad, 'I'm going to write a book. You'll see.' So when I did, and it was published, and people liked it, it was great.

It was my great problem to solve: how to write a book, you know. And after you write one, you have to write another to prove to yourself you can do it again.

I didn't start really focusing on writing until I was 24.

When I was first writing, my little prayers were, 'Please, please, please. Let something be published someday.' Then it went to, 'Please, please, please. Let somebody read this.'