Jane Haddam Quotes

Whether you're writing a horror show or a James Bond film, I think what bubbles beneath is interesting characterization. The colors that emerge through storytelling is what a dramatist does. There's always got to be something bubbling underneath that will erupt at some point.

I want readers turning pages until three o'clock in the morning. I want the themes of books to stick around for a reader. I'm always trying to find a way to balance characters and theme.

So I work hard to present the human side of my characters while not neglecting the plot.

My books, I will say one thing - they all have a driving narrative, and you have to turn the pages, and the way you do that is to create characters that you really love and care about and put them in a fairly dire situation.

To combine telling an interesting story with brilliantly written characters is the most difficult thing to do.

When you think of a great twist or a red herring or a way of misdirecting the reader, it is good, but you know that they are just tricks at the end of the day, and the way to keep interest is to write characters that people care about.

An attempt to write nothing but characterization will soon bog down; I for one don't want to have somebody tell me about someone else.

In a crime novel, if you are going to have a big revelation in chapter 30, you have to plant the information in chapters three and 11.

We set ourselves a limit and cut characters which weren't so vital.

Any show I'm working on, I want the stories to always be about something, and to have the potential to be emotional. That's the kind of story that I like.

If you know exactly what your character knows, it's a drama.

I believe that if the story is fleshed out and the characters more believable, the reader is more likely to take the journey with them. In addition, the plot can be more complex. My characters are very real to me, and I want each of my characters to be different.

In particular, I'm drawn to the stories that have big, high concepts and real characters at their heart. And I love where those two worlds meet, and 'Edge of Tomorrow' is the perfect canvas to explore that.

In order to deliver the emotional truth in the story, you have to include some of the literal truth.

In plotting a book, my goal is to raise the stakes for the characters and, in so doing, keep the reader mesmerized.

The moment comes when a character does or says something you hadn't thought about. At that moment he's alive and you leave it to him.

Settings are obviously important - and as a writer, you have to respect what was real at the time of the story you're writing. But the real key to success lies in finding the right characters to carry that story.

If the characters are acting true to themselves, then that chemistry and suspense will flow.

It interests me to imagine characters shifting from one situation and one location to another for whatever the circumstances may be.

I enjoy the writing process and producing; I enjoy seeing an idea come to fruition. I'm driven by very complex characters. You look at the pilot of 'Breaking Bad,' where there's so much depth to the character, you can't help but be invested when you watch.

It is a wonderful thing in the process of writing when such paper characters are first sketched, and, when one is doing good work, from a certain point in time they come alive and start contradicting the author as well.

An author's characters do what he wants them to do.

You just drop a character like this that and the other and it's done.

In a lot of ways, TV writing taught me how to be a good storyteller. I learned about dialogue, scenes, moving the plot forward.

I don't really approach stories to make them different from other stuff I've seen, I just try to get into the character, into his or her head. Try to make it as funny, as scary or as wild as I can so that I really like it.