Being able to read well in public and talk about your work in an engaging fashion is part of most writers' job specification.
I am completely unflustered by whichever medium people choose to read my words. I'm just delighted they're reading them at all!
Research material can turn up anywhere - in a dusty old letter in an archive, a journal or some old photographs you find in a charity shop.
One of my favourite parts of writing is doing the research. It's the door into that magical reading/writing state - the raw material for making the story real.
In more recent years, I've become more and more fascinated with the indigenous folklore of this land, Native American folklore, and also Hispanic folklore now that I live in the Southwest.
I'd had no particular interest in the Southwest at all as a young girl, and I was completely surprised that the desert stole my heart to the extent it did.
Science is not an intelligence test. Intuition is important, knowing what kind of questions to ask. The other thing is a passion for getting to the core of the problem.
Republican and Democrat are simply two different factions of the same ruling party, and their congressional battles are primarily over political spoils, not political ideology
It wasn't until two or three years ago that I actually learned that in the end he actually did kill someone. But that was a choice that he faced: to kill or be killed.
Taken together the Internet reads like the grandest character-driven novel humanity has ever known. Not much plot though.
The difference between real life and a story is that life has , while a story must have . The former is not always apparent, while the latter always has to be, before the end.
Back in Russia we were dirt-poor. Here in the West we are still poor but have risen above the dirt to tower alongside stalks of grass!
Don't worry about meaning. If a story's any good, it can't help but have meaning. Let the PhDs tell you what your story means.
In fiction, the reader will make jumps with you. If you can make the reader make that leap with you, it's a thrilling moment for everyone.
I am working to make sure we don't only protect the environment, we also improve governance.
It's the little things citizens do. That's what will make the difference. My little thing is planting trees.
There's a general culture in this country to cut all the trees. It makes me so angry because everyone is cutting and no one is planting.
We owe it to ourselves and to the next generation to conserve the environment so that we can bequeath our children a sustainable world that benefits all.
I know there is pain when sawmills close and people lose jobs, but we have to make a choice. We need water and we need these forests.
Until you dig a hole, you plant a tree, you water it and make it survive, you haven't done a thing. You are just talking.
You think people never say what they mean. The truth is, nine times out of ten what they say is all they mean.
