Ryan North Quotes

There's nothing more painful than writing.

For me, the hardest thing in the world is how to start a book.

I knew I wanted to write novels, but I could not finish what I started. The closer I got, the more ways I'd find to screw it up.

You can't write anything you want. Once you write that first chapter, then everything else is determined. You can write anything you want, but only one thing works.

When I am working on an epic-length book, the writing process is fairly long. It takes from four to five years to get through all the drafts. The book is done when I am exhausted.

I was writing fiction, but not finishing fiction.

If a story isn't working, I'm simply unable to finish it. That's what usually tells me something is wrong.

If I had to write a novel, I'd start crying after three lines.

I want to wake up one morning and know how to write page one, or page 10, or page 250. But I never seem to know how to do it. Every book is different and takes a different structure, style, process, etc. And relearning how to write is where the insanity comes from.

I found some time ago that I have to be careful, while working on a novel, what I read.

I'm not sure I have the physical strength to undertake a novel.

There's a lot of ignorance about how long it takes to write a novel. There's a lot of ignorance about how long a novel is in your head before you start to write it.

I must write the book out in my head now, before I sit down.

Usually I'll write all the way through to an end, and then I go back and try to fix the ending so that it makes sense. I don't think out the plot ahead of time.

I'm not a fast writer, and I find the process of writing a first draft to be painful and frustrating. Usually, I start with a character, a premise, and some image that gives me a particular feeling.

Writers are troubled about finding time to write and writer's block and publicizing books that aren't books yet. They agonize over how to write and what to write and what not to write.

I think I wrote 'The Trysting Place' in about three weeks. But it was inexperience that made me have to do that. I didn't feel good about the book all the time I was writing it. It felt a bit like wading through molasses.

Actually, I enjoy the process of writing a big long novel.

I once read Updike after writing a first draft, and I wanted to put my own book on the fire. I've since learned to read utter crap while I'm writing: pulp is the thing.

I'm working on a new novel, in its 3rd draft, but it's hard to write while doing 7th Heaven.

Here's the secret to finishing that first book. Don't rewrite as you go.

If you're having trouble finishing a book, it might be that you're trying to fix it as you go. Just finish the story, no matter how terrible you think that first draft is. Then let it cool off. In other words, don't look at it for a while. Then you can rewrite it.

I had been attempting novels since I was 14 but always ran out of steam. High hopes, poor craftsmanship.

I'm not nearly smart enough or imaginative enough to tackle the novel form. Never happen.

Sometimes some of these little side excursions are useful and I manage to fit them in the book somewhere.