Thomas Mallon Quotes

I'm a fictional monogamist - I can only work on one thing at a time - but each novel starts growing in my head when I'm about midway through the previous novel.

I write anywhere - when I have an idea, it's hard not to write. I used to be kind of precious about where I wrote. Everything had to be quiet and I couldn't be disturbed; it really filled my day.

Writing-wise, I like to have a lot of things on the burners at once, because when I hit a wall, I like to move on to the thing I haven't hit a wall on.

Not intending to be funny: I sit at the keyboard, put my fingers on the keys and go. To me, it's the real secret of writing. Put yourself in front of the screen or the blank sheet of paper and get to work.

I used to get up and write every day, even if I wasn't working on a specific thing. Now, when I have a thing I'm in the middle of, I do that, but when I'm not, time can go by when I'm not writing at all.

I get so many ideas for songs, but I'm so seldom disciplined enough to sit down and crank them out.

I have nothing like a writing routine. I sometimes have trouble buckling down to write at home.

A journalist also needs to be disciplined, and so do I. I am, essentially, lazy. Without discipline I'd be just a mass of gummy bears on the sofa instead of on book tour with my eighth novel.

Most people wait for the muse to turn up. That's terribly unreliable. I have to sit down and pursue the muse by attempting to work.

I write every day. Most weekdays, I write about ten hours a day. That doesn't mean eight hours of surfing the Net or watching videos on YouTube. I park my butt in a chair and write... I learned that writer's block is a myth created by people who don't have, or understand, a writing process.

I write every day. I don't have a writing schedule. I write when I feel like it. Fortunately, I feel like it all the time. I am writing for hours. I do like to write in the morning. I start after breakfast, like 9 o'clock, and I'll write till lunch, about 1. And after lunch, I just have fun.

I never think at all when I write. Nobody can do two things at the same time and do them both well.

When I'm writing, I write every day. It's lovely when that's happening. One day dovetailing into the next. Sometimes I don't even know what day of the week it is.

I'm not a disciplined writer.

I don't believe in writer's block or waiting for inspiration. If you're a writer, you sit down and write.

I usually have more than one thing I'm working on at once - I've been working on three different novels. When I get stuck on one, I hop back and forth.

It is actually a lot harder to sit down and write from A to Z. But for me at least, it's the only way I can do it, at this point, with any moderate success.

I've always found it best to have a routine. I go to my study at the same time every day and climb into my bay window. I may not be inspired every day, but on the days I am, I need to be in place to write. If I'm not particularly inspired, I'll revise or do research or correspondence.

At readings, audience members sometimes ask if I keep writing past the two hours if I'm on a roll, but I don't. I figure that if I'm on a roll, it's partially because I know I'm about to stop.

A manuscript under way always gave me something to do; only while enduring the aimlessness between books was I truly glum.

I'm a person who, when I set out to write, I write. It's just like when you set out to eat, you eat, or when you set out to sleep, you sleep. I don't do somersaults to write something. I just do it.

I'm one of those writers that have always worked on multiple things.

I can't do one thing at a time. If I'm writing song lyrics, I've got to be doing the ironing or cooking or something while I'm working. If I just sit there and stare at the walls, I get nothing.

I just write from dawn to dusk.

The two hardest things about writing are starting and not stopping.