#novel

Writing fiction is for me a fraught business, an occasion of daily dread for at least the first half of the novel, and sometimes all the way through. The work process is totally different from writing nonfiction. You have to sit down every day and make it up. ↗

— Joan Didion

#daily #day #different #down #dread

Things that appear on the front page of the newspaper as 'fact' are far more dangerous than the games played by a novelist, and can lead to wars. ↗

— E. L. Doctorow

#dangerous #fact #far #front #games

Novels for me are how I find out what's going on in my own head. And so that's a really useful and indeed critical thing to do when you do as many of these other things as I do. ↗

— Cory Doctorow

#find #going #head #how #i

I'm not the sort of writer who can walk into a party and take a look around, see who's sleeping with whom and go home and write a novel about society. It's not the way I work. ↗

— E. L. Doctorow

#around #go #go home #home #i

I found my first novel difficult. I don't want to make it sound like it's any more difficult than driving a cab or going to any other job, but there are so many opportunities for self-doubt, that you just kind of need to soldier on. ↗

— Anthony Doerr

#cab #difficult #driving #first #found

I write short stories when a little idea occurs to me, that I know isn't a part of a novel that will stand by itself and should be concentrated. ↗

— Roddy Doyle

#i #i write #idea #itself #know

I thought I wanted to be a journalist or a novelist. ↗

— Lena Dunham

#journalist #novelist #thought #wanted

A novel, in the end, is a container, a shape which you are trying to pour your story into. ↗

— Helen Dunmore

#end #in the end #into #novel #pour

However, the difficulties and pleasures of the writing itself are similar for a novel with a historical setting and a novel with a contemporary setting, as far as I'm concerned. ↗

— Helen Dunmore

#concerned #contemporary #difficulties #far #historical

It takes a lot of energy and a lot of neurosis to write a novel. If you were really sensible, you'd do something else. ↗

— Lawrence Durrell

#energy #lot #neurosis #novel #really