Mark Twain Quotes

There is no longer any such thing as fiction or nonfiction; there's only narrative.

In my mind, there's not a great difference between what people call fiction and non-fiction. So in that sense, I'm like an early-18th-century person. I actually believe there's one way of writing.

Writing is writing, and stories are stories. Perhaps the only true genres are fiction and non-fiction. And even there, who can be sure?

Ironically, in today's marketplace successful nonfiction has to be unbelievable, while successful fiction must be believable.

I like short stories.

In Bosnian, there's no distinction in literature between fiction and nonfiction; there's no word describing that.

The funny thing is that in Bosnia there are no words that are equivalent to fiction and nonfiction. From the storytelling point of view, the difference is artificial.

I've always been a little bit more of a novel reader than a short story reader. I think the first books that made me want to be a writer were novels.

Short stories are fiction's R & D department, and failed or less-than-conclusive experiments are not just to be expected but to be hoped for.

There are many reasons why novelists write, but they all have one thing in common - a need to create an alternative world.

Most books aren't pure nonfiction or fiction.

You can tell a more over-the-top incredible story if you use a nonfiction form.

I like novelists who can create other interesting worlds.

What is most important to me is that my narrator's voice is believable, and that, though it is clearly an absolute fiction, it has the emotional resonance of memoir.

Novels will remain my meat and potatoes, what sustain me imaginatively.

I am a better novelist than a poet, playwright, or essayist.

Fiction isn't memoir and memoir isn't fiction.

I read a lot of fiction.

If you are a novelist of a certain type of temperament, then what you really want to do is re-invent the world. God wasn't too bad a novelist, except he was a Realist.

A good novel is a good novel, pointe finale. And I think what I'm writing is exactly that.

A few people have tried to make me see that my writing isn't quite their thing by saying to me: 'What about realism?' To which my general response is, 'What about it?' However, I wouldn't be at all surprised if one of my favorite writers, Marilynne Robinson, was to say something similar if asked 'What about the fantastic?'

When I write for kids, I have to make sure they know what can't happen. They have to know it's a fantasy. But when I write for adults, they have to think it's real. Every detail has to be real or they won't buy it.

I write contemporary fiction, and that is what my readers want to read.

Oh you know, I've been writing a novel.

I am really excited by the form of short fiction.