I've been writing since I was sixteen. At first, I wrote mostly short stories and poetry. The first thing I ever had published was a poem about a football game. It was printed in my local newspaper.
I remain convinced that the most valuable use of time for a newly published author is to write a second book that's even better than the first, and a third that's better than the second, and on and on.
In 1996, when my first novel, 'Masquerade,' was published, I knew international thrillers - or spy novels, if you prefer - had been the domain of male authors for decades.
Cory Doctorow should be too busy for lunch. He's co-editor of, and a prolific contributor to, one of the most influential blogs in the world, Boing Boing. Over the past decade the Canadian-born writer has published 16 books, mostly science fiction novels. He campaigns vigorously on the politics of the digital age.
I started blogging in 2006 when I had sold my first novel but it had not yet been published, in those anxious months in between while I learned the whole process.
When 'Watchmen' was published in 1986, the vast majority of comics readers deemed it a watershed in comics history. The 12-part serial comic book was widely acclaimed as a genius subversion of the superhero genre, and it did much to popularize comics to adults.
You can work really hard and well on something, and someone you respect might hate it; worse, they're not empirically wrong for doing so. This is scary, especially for people who haven't been published.
Up until my first book was published, I had all this potential, people would say, and I screwed up. After it, I could say: 'No, I didn't screw up.'
There were many times in my initial days as a writer when I had felt the need to talk to someone, to leverage on someone's experience, to learn from someone who had written and published a book.
For a novelist, no matter what, it's a complete work, even if it's not published. But if you write a screenplay, and it's not performed, then it's a sad and frustrating experience.
Don't see the point in reading ghost-written autobiographies, even though some of these published lives may fascinate me. The 'ghost' is always present, manipulating an interview into first-person singular text, and it feels like I'm reading a lie.
In the two novels I have published, it was my fortune at different times, and from different persons, to hear the most unqualified censure long before it was possible for me to hear the voice of the public. But my temper was not altered, nor my courage subdued.
I wrote three books before I got one published. Most writers do. Have faith, and know that with each work you are getting better.
I write for the love of writing. If I never published another book, I would still be writing stories.
'The Paris Review' was always the pinnacle: it was the place to be published. You were thrilled if you were published in 'The Paris Review,' and George Plimpton himself was practically mythical. He was a legendary figure.
I was on holiday recently and I came home to find that one of the papers here had 'bikini'd' me on the beach. I was wearing a grossly unflattering costume and they had published photographs of me taken from behind. I looked dreadful. I went into our local newsagent and bought up every copy.
A whole bunch of agents and editors looked at my stories, and they all said, in effect, 'You're a pretty good writer and you should probably get these published; when you grow up and write a novel, get in touch.'
Having a book published whenever is a huge honor.
Ninety-five percent of all writers who write do not get published, but 100 percent of all writers write because they have a voice in their head. The vast majority of writers simply write because they have to.
My first novel, 'In the Drink,' begun when I was 29 and floundering and published when I was 36 and married, was about a 29-year-old woman whose life was even more screwed up than my own had been.
I read the final Wallander novel, 'The Troubled Man,' not long after it was published.
Certainly one of the surprising truths of having a book published is realizing that your book is as open to interpretation as an abstract painting. People bring their own beliefs and attitudes to your work, which is thrilling and surprising at the same time.
When I became a published writer, I said, 'Whatever I can do to help the libraries I want to do,' so all of my book tours since then have involved me coming to a library and talking about how important libraries are for a community.
Let me now praise the American writer James Dickey. In 1970, his novel 'Deliverance' was published. I found it to be 278 pages that approached perfection. Its tightness of construction and assuredness of style reminded me of 'The Great Gatsby.'
In February 1932, the 'Times' published an account of community resistance to the eviction of three families in the Bronx, observing, 'Probably because of the cold, the crowd numbered only 1,000.'
I have been writing poetry since 1975. My first poetry book was published in 1986.
I don't reread my books after they're published, because it's agony.
Quite a few books about decluttering are published in a year.
Every day since the start of the Tour de France, the popular 'Le Parisien' newspaper has published a story about a book written with the bicycle in mind.
I didn't get anything published until I was thirty-three, and yet I'd written five novels and six or seven plays. The plays, I should point out, were dreadful.
I've written a lot of books now; I've been published for over 30 years. I hope with every book I learn something new, and with every new novel I try to improve the process of writing.
Write a million words before thinking about getting published.
When the 'Book of Mormon' was first published, some of those who believed in it taught it to others and testified of it.
When I was in high school at Northeast Catholic in Philadelphia in the late '30s, I found that drawing caricatures of the teachers and satirizing the events in the school, then having them published in our school magazine, got me some notoriety.
I certainly was performing before my writing was published, because I was performing when I was very young. And the thing is I'm very comfortable on stage, so a large portion of my act did come from ad-libs.
Even after I'd published three books and had been writing full-time for twenty years, my father continued to urge me to go to law school.
