I have no formal training as a writer at all, not even a single English class in college. However, my adult books are all science fiction, which has some similarities to YA.
If you are not moving closer to what you want, you probably aren't doing enough asking. And you're probably not asking the single most important question that can help you achieve a higher level of success and personal fulfillment: How am I doing?
I never met Peter O'Toole, but he one was of those rare actors whose success was defined by a single role. His incandescent performance in David Lean's 'Lawrence of Arabia' is one that nobody who saw it will ever forget.
That first meeting - the one where the hero and heroine start the slow burn that takes the whole story to turn into true love - is the single most important part of the whole book. Nail it, and you've won yourself readers.
There is perhaps no more rewarding romance heroine than she who is not expected to find love. The archetype comes in many disguises - the wallflower, the spinster, the governess, the single mom - but always with one sad claim: Love is not in her card...
I think from an artist standpoint, you have to put out music that you feel like represents you and things you feel like your crowd wants to hear. And if that drives them to go and download the album or the single, that's what we want.
I think the record industry has gotten to be more about labels wondering what the new single is rather than labels nurturing artists. It's gotten away from making a full album of music that someone would want to listen to all the way through.
In days when the public safety is imminently threatened, and the fate of a nation may hang upon a single act, we owe frank speech, above all other men, to him who is highest in authority. I shall speak to you as man to man.
Think of all the really successful men and women you know. Do you know a single one who didn't learn very young the trick of calling attention to himself in the right quarters?
My very sassy, older southern sister is very quick to point out that it's a luxury that my daughter gets to come to work with me. She does, and I have lunch with her every single day. My mom says I have 'high class problems.'
My mom was a single mother, raising my sister and me. My mom has an incredible talent for living in the world without traditional structure, and her friend, who was in advertising, put me in a commercial when I was five. It was just to make money.
My mom has always said that the one thing she wishes she had done differently is have a job. She felt like the single-mindedness made her a little nuts sometimes, and she could have used an outlet for herself when we were little.
I remember watching the Blu-ray, and also when they first released it on DVD in the collection of all three movies of 'The Godfather,' and seeing all of those scenes that they cut out, and there wasn't a single one of them that I wished they had kept...
I feel really humbled because I decided to go on Twitter, and all of my fans on Twitter say one thing consistently every single day, and that is, 'When are you coming back in movies?' I didn't even think people missed me that much.
I'm a single parent, and I just found that it was too difficult to manage raising my kids and doing the traveling involved in making movies. So I took a little bit of a break. And the little bit of a break turned into a longer break, and then I found...
Jake Sully: I became a Marine for the hardship. Told myself that I can pass any test a man can pass. All I ever wanted was a single thing worth fighting for.
I tried talking to a psychologist once. Two minutes in, I said, 'Ciao!' Never again. There's no way, no way, I'd continue! I couldn't buy into a single thing the guy was saying.
There are all kinds of addictions, and I've got every single one. If you set me in front of anything, I will do it until I ram it into the ground and it's done working for me.
We can appreciate but not really understand the medieval town. We cannot comprehend its compactness, the contiguity of all its buildings as a single uninterrupted whole.
The strength of the Constitution lies entirely in the determination of each citizen to defend it. Only if every single citizen feels duty bound to do his share in this defense are the constitutional rights secure.
Imagine a world in which no writer has written a literary novel in sixty years. Imagine a place where not a single person has read a book that is truly about the character at its center.
