Alistair Maclean Quotes

I can write a book in probably three months.

I'm remembering one book that I wrote, 'Fourth Grade Rats,' that took a month to write, but most of them, full-length novels, I would say about a year.

I was swimming in my swimming pool when 'The Secret Lovers' popped entire into my head. I got out, dried off, went upstairs, and finished the book in about 50 days.

I think 'Hollow City' only took a year and a half to write... but it felt like two and a half!

I used to get up and write every day, even if I wasn't working on a specific thing. Now, when I have a thing I'm in the middle of, I do that, but when I'm not, time can go by when I'm not writing at all.

I'm writing all the time. I tend to work on at least two books simultaneously. I'll spend time with one, and then I'll spend time with the other. Finishing takes whatever time it takes.

I like writing. I get cranky when I can't. Yes, I write books back to back, and I work very hard on them.

Probably not needing to be published would give me more time to think about a book.

I am a big outliner. For my adult book, 'The Visibles,' I did not outline, and it took me two years to write because I just didn't outline, and I had no path.

The more I want a book to be done, the faster I type because I just want to get it out.

Some people take 10 years to write a book and some can do one in under a year.

I wrote every day. I don't think I could have written 'Just Kids' had I not spent all of the 80s developing my craft as a writer.

Fortunately or unfortunately, NaNoWriMo requires you to write at a breakneck pace, so I got used to just pushing on through.

So I thought I should write five pages a day. And that's what I did. Eventually I had a book.

It depends on the book and what else is going on during my life, but it usually takes me about six months to write and revise the first draft.

The minimum I need is six months to allow for dithering, procrastination and the research. The research times varies from book to book; some are faster because they're based off resources I have at my disposal.

Of the 60 movies I wrote, more than half were written in two weeks or less.

It usually takes about a year to write each book. I don't plan it that way. I don't set deadlines. If a book wants to take longer, it can.

I kind of like to write fast. It keeps the pacing up. And it keeps me off the streets.

My method is, I just sit down and write a book.

The first draft of a book—even a long one—should take no more than three months, the length of a season.

People imagine that there are rituals, like lighting candles or sacrificing chickens. They really just want to know what the magic formula is for writing. I inevitably disappoint them by saying you just put your butt in the chair, and you write 500 words a day, and then you get up and repeat it the next morning.

Take the time to write. You can do your life's work in half an hour a day.

I write every day. I'm always in the process of writing my last book, until the next one.

I have to make myself write, sometimes. In the space between poems, you somehow forget how to do it, where to begin. It was good to be task - based for a while. I just came downstairs each day, picked the one I was going to do that day, and wrote.