I think kids in every minority need to see people like themselves in books; that's an acknowledgment of their existence on this planet and in this society.
I came to think that nobody from England could draw American comic books, because they were clearly all done by this sort of Mafia, all these guys with Italian and Irish names who had the whole thing sewn up. It was actually seeing a comic book drawn by Barry Smith, who was about my age, and English.
We always talk about how the first several seasons were faithful to the books, and anybody who wanted to could go onto Wikipedia and learn Ned Stark gets beheaded or about The Red Wedding, and most people don't want to know - because why ruin a story?
I think publishing's strength is also its weakness. It's got such a rich and celebrated history as an industry. For the most part, publishing people are incredibly creative, business is done based on the strength of relationships, and the product being peddled is books.
When you get inside a literary novel you feel that the author, more often than not, just doesn't know enough about things. They haven't been around enough - novelists never go anywhere. Once I discovered true books about real things - books like 'How To Run a Company' - I stopped reading novels.
I can't actually wrap my mind around it easily - I can't really visualize what 2 million books looks like... So I try to keep it real for myself by focusing on individual anecdotes of how my books have helped kids learn to love reading.
I think there's a great difference in consciousness in that same way in that when we're young we read books for the story, for the excitement of the story - and there comes a time when you realise that all stories are more or less the same story.
I'm not funny. People assume that because my books are funny, I'll be funny in real life. It's the inevitable disappointment of meeting me.
There are nineteen Harry Bosch books, and someone told me if you add up the descriptions of Harry from all of them, it would come to less than three pages. He's very elliptically described over the two decades during which the novels occur. I did that by intention.
I buy a lot of books I never read. But that's not really a waste, since all it takes is one idea from even one book to radically reshape the way a person leads, thinks and lives.
Teen problem novels? I can go through them like a box of chocolates. And there are fantasy books out now that need a lot more editing. Fantasy got to be so popular that people began to think 'We don't need to be as diligent with the razor blade,' but they do.
The Booker Prize is a big, popular prize for big, popular books, and that's the way it should be.
My first book was poetry, but I didn't write it first. I wrote it third. So my first two books were prose.
In history books, or the one about the guy who cut his hand off to get out of a canyon in Utah, you really want them to be accurate. But my stuff is such small beer by comparison.
I've stopped reading about my books on the Internet because it's too hurtful.
I've never seen an 'English' books section in, well, an English bookshop, but in Scotland, most bookshops have a set of shelves dedicated to Scottish authors.
The oldest books are only just out to those who have not read them.
A surgeon wouldn't sell his tools. A lawyer doesn't sell his law books. I'm not going to sell my horse. I'm a sportsman.
I remember thinking that people were crazy for reading the same book more than once, but I now have a new-found appreciation for the re-discovery of literature. The lessons we learned from books in the school curriculum are reinvented and updated when we read as adults.
A book is not necessarily made of paper. A book is not necessarily made to be read on a Kindle. A book is a collection of text, organized in one of a variety of ways. You could say that words printed on paper and bound between cloth covers will someday be obsolete. But if and when that day comes, there will still be a thing called books.
I don't really have a lot of hobbies. I listen to a lot of spoken word. I get books on tape.
Perhaps it is partly that we need to love books ourselves as parents, grandparents and teachers in order to pass on that passion for stories to our children. It's not about testing and reading schemes, but about loving stories and passing on that passion to our children.
'Pretty Little Liars' - my sister and I read the books, so we stuck to it for the first season, but it started to kind of drift off; so did we.
At the time I wrote 'Forever,' I had a 14-year-old daughter, and she was reading a lot of books about young love.
I might defend the reviewing trade, but a handful of haughty hired hands no longer having the last word on books is not a bad thing.
I love books, and I love to read, and I had ideas for books that I thought would be neat to read.
I use an e-reader when I'm traveling: I love carrying dozens of books on a small lightweight device, and I'm still amazed every time I purchase and immediately start reading a new title without leaving my hotel room - in another country!
It's strange: I've done so many things up until I did 'Obvious Child,' including writing children's books and making 'Marcel the Shell.' To me, the through-line is incredibly clear: it all comes from wanting to be connected to my own inner voice and not wanting to be on somebody else's agenda if that means that I can't be myself.
I have written some poetry and two prose books about baseball, but if I had been a rich man, I probably would not have written many of the magazine essays that I have had to do. But, needing to write magazine essays to support myself, I looked to things that I cared about and wanted to write about, and certainly baseball was one of them.
I'm a big believer in big books, and that doesn't necessarily mean long books.
I have earned wages as a waitress, a nanny, a librarian, a personnel officer, an agricultural laborer, an advertising secretary, a typesetter, a proofreader, a mental-health-care provider, a substitute teacher, and a book reviewer. In and around the edges of all those jobs I have written poems, stories, and books, books, books.
Now Dave Eggers, if you lived in San Francisco, is not an easy person to be done with. Everyone - and by everyone, I mean every white person with a college education and an interest in books - wants a piece of him. It's not just his amazingly powerful prose; it's also his charitable works.
My favorite film is 'The Empire Strikes Back.' My writing, and my personal taste in movies and books, tends toward works with a darker tone, and 'Empire' fits that the best of all the movies.
I really care about my readers. I care about anyone who reads my books.
I've loved all my books, but I will admit that 'The Man from Stone Creek' holds a very special place in my heart.
I want to write more books, see my first novel made into a film, fight more campaigns, work in more countries. I want to be able to recall experiences that have endured for their pleasure and range and intensity.
