Lionel Shriver Quotes

Writing a novel is an intense and lonely business, but you have the reward at the end of a very direct dialogue between you and the reader.

In the end, my reasons for moving down the timeline and introducing a new cast have more to do with keeping myself entertained, on the assumption that if I get bored, my readers are going to be even more bored.

My novels come from within me; they are things I feel I want to do.

I spent some time, six months or so, ruminating about the characters before I sat down to write 'Faith'.

I do want to write about Jane Whitefield again, but only when I have a good enough idea - something I've figured out about her that's news and that's worth a reader's time.

I'm a novelist, so I can't write about ideas unless they're attached to people.

I've never abandoned the novel.

Writing a book for me, I expect, is very similar to the experience of reading the book for my readers.

And the nice thing about writing a novel is you take your time, you sit with the character sometimes nine years, you look very deeply at a situation, unlike in real life when we just kind of snap something out.

If there is any secret to my success, I think it's that my characters are very real to me. I feel everything they feel, and therefore I think my readers care about them.

Writing a novel is not merely going on a shopping expedition across the border to an unreal land: it is hours and years spent in the factories, the streets, the cathedrals of the imagination.

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.

Only in very rare circumstances will you see something cut out of my first drafts. Maybe it's because of the way I write. I'm very focused on the logical progression of the story, and every character has a role to play.

I love writing letters. In order to write a novel in first person, I think I needed an addressee.

I think of novels as houses. You live in them over the course of a long period, both as a reader and as a writer.

You can throw a novel into focus with one overheard line.

There comes a point when you're writing a novel when you're in it so deep that the life of the novel becomes more real to you than life itself. You have to write your way out of it; once you're there, it's too late to abandon.

Writing a novel is a huge adventure; when it's going well it's more fun than fun. When it stutters to a halt put it aside. Go for a swim, go for a walk, take a week off. Don't panic or be afraid; you and your characters are in it together. Trust them to come to your rescue.

I was very fortunate that my first novel captivated the imaginations of so many readers who asked for a sequel. After that, one book led to another as I discovered other facets to my characters I wanted to investigate further.

Since I was there in the very beginning, I know the history of the characters. So, I make comments about the tone and sometimes remind the writers that we've done that before.

No one knows how to write a novel until it's been written.

Writing a novel is actually searching for victims. As I write I keep looking for casualties. The stories uncover the casualties.

After a while, the characters I'm writing begin to feel real to me. That's when I know I'm heading in the right direction.

When you write a novel, you never have to be in the service of the reader. My only concern with my books is that the world that's created be as logical and whole as possible.

The novelist in me is probably hiding behind all the stories I write, looking for ways to connect them and continue the conversation with readers. Maybe I'm writing one long narrative, and each book, however different from the last, is just a chapter.