Mark Leyner Quotes

One thing we never did with 'Bad Company' was talk down to our reader. And we certainly don't do that with the new story, 'Bad Company, First Casualties.'

What any writer hopes for is that the reader will stick with you to the end of the contract and that there is a level of submission on the reader's part.

I write things in my house, and hopefully there's a reader out there who enjoys it and has an experience with it, but that's very different than a performer on stage, where there's an immediate dance with the audience. It's incredibly powerful.

Critics have a problem with sentimentality. Readers do not. I write for readers.

You can't visit readers where you think they are. You have to invite them home to where you are and try to lure them into your universe. That's the art of storytelling.

The prime goal of an author is the same as a musician, which is to emotionally connect with the reader in some way or another.

I write what I'd like to read and just hope that, along the way, others might like to read them, too.

Writers are in the entertainment business, and it gives me lots of pleasure to entertain my readers.

Too many writers of fiction don't give the reader enough credit.

I'm very aware of the presence of a reader, and that probably is a reaction against a lot of poems that I do read which seem oblivious to my presence as a reader.

My job is to entertain the readers in such a manner that, when they reach the end of the book, they feel like they've gotten their money's worth.

I try to write short novels and leave details out not because I want to be minimalist, but because I think that it enables the readers' creativity and interaction with the book.

I'm sometimes asked if I get bored with talking about 'Kevin,' and of course, the short answer is yes. Nevertheless, after a long slog in the literary trenches, I never take a single reader for granted and always remind myself that for new readers the unfolding story is fresh.

I'm not standing above the audience trying to manipulate them as a puppet master or a trickster; I'm inside the story I'm writing and making and thinking about things very seriously and feeling very deeply at times, and trying to translate that into a narrative.

You care a lot about these stories you're writing, and you hope that someone else will care, too.

I'm not a great writer of literature. I'm an entertainer.

As long as I'm writing stuff and people are reading it, I'll be happy.

I think the novel is at one end of the art-entertainment continuum - the play in the middle - while TV and cinema veer a bit more towards entertainment.

I don't like books that play to the gallery, but I've become more concerned with telling a story as clearly and engagingly as I can.

I'm writing for entertainment. I like people to reach the end and feel they got their money's worth.

If there are 100 people, I don't anticipate all 100 liking my scenario - but I write it so at least one or two of them will love and get really into that particular story.

The challenge is to stay true to the characters while also having them be entertaining every day, because it turns out that just watching someone be true to themselves isn't that rad to watch.

I always say the wrestlers provide the music and the announcers write the lyrics. You have to feel what you're seeing and experiencing to write the best lyrics.

People never read my books for the quality of the documentary value.

I think Shakespeare, at his heart, was just the way all of us are that make movies: He wanted to entertain people.