James Ellroy Quotes

Writing itself is a dream. There are days of self doubt and deadlines and wondering how you're going to pay the bills until you write that bestseller. But it's still the best job I've ever had. I've also been able to help a lot of people and even inspire a few and that feels great.

For a dyed-in-the-wool author, nothing is as dead as a book once it is written. She is rather like a cat whose kittens have grown up.

You know one of the things about going from modeling to acting is it's so much more fulfilling. With modeling, you get your picture taken, which is great, good for you, you know? But in acting, you're able to reach in and show a little bit more of yourself.

My most successful books, the ones that I feel the strongest about, are the ones that started with a premise that for me was deeply emotional.

I've always known my dad is a one-off and his own person. But I feel that underneath he has always loved me.

We become attached to certain characters in novels, mostly because they have some mystery attaching to them. We re-read the books, but we're still left wanting to know more. In my own case, it was 'Great Expectations' and Miss Havisham in particular. Luckily, writers have the option of making up the knowledge that reading doesn't supply.

Don't forget there are two sides to performing. Finding the truth, but you also have to be transparent enough for the audience to see it. How many times have you seen a performance and thought: 'Well, it seems to be meaning a great deal to you but it ain't coming across to me?' It is to be shared.

As an actor, you know when you've got great material in front of you. When you're working, you think, 'Is this the one? The one that everyone will respond to and be moved by?' You pray that you have told the story well... that your peers will see it and audiences will love it.

Every novel generates its own climate, when you get going.

Fiction is the thing I esteem most in my own work; I feel that, even if it's no good, only I could have written those books.

I always find that really interesting, you know, when I get to see characters that I love in TV and film and theater around their family.

I want to have compassion for my characters - I feel like I am the characters when I'm writing them.

Then about 1951 I began writing again, painfully, a novel I called in the beginning A Life Sentence on Earth, but which developed into The Tree of Man.

As an actor, every opportunity, every role, everything that I do is an opportunity to have someone have a human experience with my work. I don't just want it to be about a cute wardrobe and a high paycheck.

I knew as far back as 2001 that I would write a book called 'A Visit From the Goon Squad,' though I had no idea what kind of book it would be.

Writing the 'Crossfire' series is deeply personal for me, and I love the whole process of it.

There's a joy in acting that's not present in writing, but there's a gratification in writing and creating that you can't necessarily find in acting.

When you're actually inside the experience of writing something, in some ways, you're just writing. Ultimately, you fall in love with the characters, and you get excited about the story, and you're sitting there in your sweatpants or pajamas, and you do get a little lost in it.

To be able to create a character and tell a story is a crazy way to make a living. I feel so lucky to be able to do this.

I think seeing the love between a mother and child is something we can all really relate to. You can remember it from your own childhood perspective.

There's nothing more thrilling than watching great actors say things that you wrote and bring them to life.

I feel so lucky to have a mom who is not only an extraordinary actor but someone who is game enough to not worry about our relationship versus what we play in movies or television.

I don't read my own books, but sometimes if there is a new edition I open it and then I feel this life of a writer was not so hopeless, not so bad.

I liked the idea of being a writer more than I liked the idea of writing.

'Anderson' is what I've been called since I was a kid; my mom is about the only person who calls me 'Mike.'