Diana Gabaldon Quotes

That is what I define as a novel: something that has a beginning, a middle and an end, with characters and a plot that sustain interest from the first sentence to the last. But that is not what I do at all.

Titles are important; I have them before I have books that belong to them. I have last chapters in my mind before I see first chapters, too. I usually begin with endings, with a sense of aftermath, of dust settling, of epilogue.

Without sounding too pretentious, I was sort of a slave to the narrative. When the narrative cracks in, I have to go where it takes me. I had to go to the Bohemian Grove. It was the obvious end to the book.

Plot is what happens in your story. Every story needs structure, just as every body needs a skeleton. It is how you 'flesh out and clothe' your structure that makes each story unique.

If I can tell you the story from beginning to end in five minutes, I'm ready to start writing. Then it's a constant spreading out of that five minutes.

Every day, I learn something new. I think one of the most exciting things for a writer is to work on a TV show. It's like a novel. You have a really long time to develop and learn about the characters, and you can just really keep digging in deeper, every week.

Marc Cherry is so good at writing himself into a corner, then writing himself out of that corner. It's really fun to watch that.

In a story, you have to have a theme and an angle, you have to have a beginning, middle and an end. You have to have a defining moment and kick it to death. You gotta be able to recognize that, by the way. It probably takes experience.

If you're writing a screenplay from scratch, it involves a lot of creation.

First and foremost, it's got to be on the page. It starts with the writing.

I've always believed that the script is the boss.

A plot without action is like pasta without garlic, like Dolly Parton without cleavage, and like a writer without his similes.

My writing has always been what you call 'narrative fiction' in the sense that it's got very strong plots and twists at the end.

I am not an analytical writer. Once I flesh out my characters and decide on the elements of my plot, the story unfolds in my head almost as though it was a movie reel.

A subplot is a distinguishing characteristic of the novel; the short story, for example, does not need subplots.

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.

I have struggles in screenwriting that lead me to a third act that's always more or less efficiently wrapped up in a fourth act that's trying to give closure to too many things.

Stories of all lengths and depths come from different parts of the cave. For a novel, you must lay in mental, physical and spiritual provision as for a siege or for a time of hectic explosions, while a short story is, or can be, a steady, timed flame like the lighting of a blow lamp on a building site full of dry tinder.

It's nice to know when you're a part of a story, it's nice to know at least something about the beginning, middle, and end.

I'll often dream about characters before I start writing their stories.

I want to tell a story and shape it all the way through to the end.

I have a plot, but not much happens.

When I begin to write a story, I usually know how things will end. It's the journey toward that point I must discover. The process is sometimes painful, but also exciting.

I never know as a writer when I set out into a novel where it's going to take me.

In each scene, the writer sets up a situation, which brings a conflict as well as either a small victory or a loss at the close of that particular scene.