Jodi Picoult Quotes

I write anywhere - when I have an idea, it's hard not to write. I used to be kind of precious about where I wrote. Everything had to be quiet and I couldn't be disturbed; it really filled my day.

Being a writer involves writing. You've got to commit to sitting down and writing instead of Xbox or Netflix.

I don't write listening to music, and in a way it seems silly that any writer should have to explain why not, as it's possibly no different from saying you don't eat gourmet dinners or play tennis while you're at the keyboard.

Not intending to be funny: I sit at the keyboard, put my fingers on the keys and go. To me, it's the real secret of writing. Put yourself in front of the screen or the blank sheet of paper and get to work.

The main thing about writing is... writing. Sitting your butt down in the chair and doing the work.

To write, I think one must sit in one place and be bored. Boredom is a very good state for writers to be. Things cook away in your head when you're bored, and suddenly one day, you have a book or a germ of a book.

You can write any time people will leave you alone and not interrupt you. Or, rather, you can if you will be ruthless enough about it. But the best writing is certainly when you are in love.

I started writing when I had three kids under the age of 4. I used to write every ten minutes I got to sit in front of a computer. Now, when I have more time, I function the same way: if it's writing time, I write.

People say to me, 'Oh, being a mother must make you a better actor,' and I think, 'Well, I never sleep, I have very little time to think about anything except when I'm actually there.' I wonder whether that makes me a better actor. I think it must on some level.

But the ultimate lesson is just sit down and write. That's all.

Bringing my two children up while writing was just a part of life. I'd much rather have had their interruptions than been stuck in a sterile office. This way, I had welcome distractions. I had to load the washing machine, I had to go out and buy lemons.

If you love something - and there are things that I love - you do want more and more and more of it, but that's not the way to produce good work. So as an author, I need to write what I need to write.

I'm always amazed by writers who say, 'Oh you know I had a half hour so I sat down and wrote a little bit.' I just need a real big chunk of time to sit down and focus. That's my process.

My last book, 'The Language of Flowers,' I wrote completely on naptime, when my little kids were asleep.

I spend 99 percent of my time writing.

I just write from dawn to dusk.

I'm trying to get my head in the game, think about the questions I wanted to ask, breast milk is flying everywhere - over my notes - and I - how do you 'lean in' at that moment? What is the equivalent of that for Wolf Blitzer or Joe Scarborough?

Writing is a sufficiently lonely and mysterious pastime that I don't begrudge myself a talisman or two, so long as they don't become ways of distracting myself from the glum inescapability of actual work.

I spend most of my time writing.

I don't want to blame anybody, but I just want to tell you that the process of writing is antisocial, so on the days that you have something really important to write, go from lying down directly to your notepad or your computer. Do not talk.

I don't need music to write, but sometimes I put music on. I don't need special clothes or even my own equipment.

I have met so many people who say they've got a book in them, but they've never written a word. To be a writer - this may seem trite, I realize - you have to actually write.

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.

As a writer, I've always been somebody who's been productive and hustled hard.

Every time that I write a novel I am convinced for at least two years that it is the last one, because a novel is like a child. It takes two years after its birth. You have to take care of it. It starts walking, and then speaking.