Sarah Zettel Quotes

I like that it's challenging - that when I'm writing, I feel as if I'm pouring everything I have into the story until there's nothing left and I have to begin thinking about a new world and set of circumstances to research and explore.

Deciding to write a novel about something - as opposed to finding you are writing a novel around something - sounds to me like a good evocation of writer's block.

My stories run up and bite me on the leg - I respond by writing down everything that goes on during the bite. When I finish, the idea lets go and runs off.

Usually after finishing a novel, I have a head full of bad ideas for the next one.

At first, I see pictures of a story in my mind. Then creating the story comes from asking questions of myself. I guess you might call it the 'what if - what then' approach to writing and illustration.

I always say that, for me, writing a book is like a wacky Greyhound bus trip - I know where I'm starting and where I'll end up, but I have no idea what will happen along the way.

Often, writer's block will occur when I don't understand a character or his/her motivations. So I will make notes analysing characters.

A novel is a big thing. It's difficult to hold the whole story in your mind, especially when you've finished a first draft and are still giddy from the flow of creative juices.

One thing about writing 'The Sarah Silverman Program' was the concern that I don't give myself the best story, you know what I mean?

I frequently have scenes that take place in places I've never been or characters who have professions that I know nothing about that I've got to research. But that's what Google is for.

Authors like reading. Go figure. So it's not surprising that we sometimes bog down in the research stage of new writing projects.

Plot is not my forte. It's like I have to live in my head in the book for a while before I figure out what the story is... My process is a bit messier.

I binge write, basically. I do a lot of prep, research, setup. I'll have a pretty detailed outline. Sort of like a beat outline. And then I'll add little notes and dialogue ideas, and I'll just create a 20-page document.

Every book has got its challenges. You run into a plot point that you can't figure out, or a scene that you struggle to write and have to write 50 times.

I start with a character and a situation, but I don't know what's going to happen until I write it. Sometimes things happen that surprise me.

I find getting the first draft down to be the biggest challenge. Every word, every punctuation mark, every plot point is a decision. It's much more fun to play with something that already exists.

My writing process hasn't changed - it's is the same whether I'm working on a Y.A. novel or, as now, a new novel for adults. A lot of reading, a lot of research if the subject warrants it, a lot of sticky notes and scraps of paper - and get to work.

I think some people think that writers read and read and read, get the information, and then write. That's not how it works. Often, you write yourself into a dark place where you don't know what you need to know, so you go get the information.

For me, the easiest thing to figure out is the story I want to tell, and the hardest thing is to figure out the voice that's gonna tell it. And that's why I finish very little.

I do better just letting the stories develop. I don't outline very well, and I can't follow it if I do. Once I've outlined it, why write the damn book?

While I was writing 'Elizabeth Is Missing' and struggling with the intricacies of the plot, I told myself the next book would be really simple and linear, and I'd have it all worked out before I set down a single word.

Every story teaches me how to write it. Unfortunately, it doesn't teach me how to write the next one.

The thing I love about being a novelist is that with each project, you invent a new world. You approach it with a different set of aesthetic and structural ideas, and you grapple with a different series of problems in figuring out how to tell the story. And yet there are certain concerns that stay constant.

I'm not one of these 'the characters write themselves; the story just fell out of me' kind of writers. Wish it was like that.

I'm at the mercy of whatever character comes into my head.