Author Interaction Quotes

Teenage readers also have a different relationship with the authors whose work they value than adult readers do. I loved Toni Morrison, but I don't have any desire to follow her on Twitter. I just want to read her books.

Engage with your readers as often as you can. Readers, myself included, want a relationship with everyone in their lives, even the people behind the pages of their favorite books.

I want to be heavily tied to a city that I write for every week, that knows my stuff and I can interact with.

As opposed to being on the Internet, there's something really nice about reading a book or talking to authors.

The first author I met socially was Joyce Cary.

As a teenager I wrote to R.A. Lafferty. And he responded, too, with letters that were like R.A. Lafferty short stories, filled with elliptical answers to straight questions and simple answers to complicated ones.

I've signed peoples' parole cards at book signings and it's very touching.

I would never read a book if it were possible for me to talk half an hour with the man who wrote it.

I was the type of person who was the question-asker. And not just genuine questions, I would ask a question so the author would know how much I knew about them. Once I went to a Tobias Wolff reading. I knew he was teaching at Syracuse at that time. And so, I remember asking him how he liked Syracuse. People do that to me now and it's okay. There is rarely a time when I just have had enough.

If you liked a book, don't meet the author

Soon after publishing a book for kids, my mailbox began to fill with letters from children all across America. Not because my novels for young readers are bestsellers - they're not by a long shot - but because today's kids love to write to authors.

In open-source in general, the power lies in connecting the author of the software directly to users, eliminating the middleman.

Well, I know that George Lucas doesn't like it at all. When I was working on The Illustrated Star Wars Universe, he told me that he would be happy if every copy could be tracked down and smashed.

[On writing to Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple:] I told her I would play a Venetian blind, dirt on the floor, anything.

I do not read a book; I hold a conversation with the author.

I am of the generation of writers who can get instant feedback from readers within hours of publication. The fan forum is extraordinary - readers from all over the world coming together to discuss, argue and debate scenes and characters from a novel. They add a layer to the story that I cannot write and yes, I will participate in that conversation and answer questions. After all, they are the people I'm writing for and their enthusiasm and questions really pushes me to raise the bar.

I don't know why Sinclair Lewis fell in love with me. He didn't get even the slightest response from me. But his letters were lovely. And the poems he wrote me were lovely. I used some of them in my book.

Best-selling writers should go to bookstores to say thanks to the booksellers, to meet fans, sign autographs, sign books, talk, whatever.

Gone are the days when a publisher could take out an ad, count on a few reviews, and have an author do a couple of signings. Nowadays, readers want to feel a connection with an author.

Attending a book group is always a salutary experience for a writer. There's no guarantee that the people there will have enjoyed your book, and, as anyone who has taken part in a book group will know, half the fun is in ripping a book you haven't liked to shreds.

I love kids that come to shows, little kids coming up to you with braces; like, some kid came up to me in a parking lot outside a show in Santa Cruz - he was about 14 or 15 - and he said, 'Y'know, I love 'The Basketball Diaries,' but I hope your next book of poetry isn't gonna be as academic as 'Living at the Movies' was.'

I have nothing but praise for J. K. Rowling. Her contribution - apart from the books themselves, obviously - is showing writers how to interact with the 21st Century.

Working with Dav Pilkey was a dream come true. Dav is incredibly funny, and he's been a hero of mine for a long time. It was great bringing the 'Wimpy Kid' and 'Captain Underpants' worlds together!

Most of the people who write to me are really clever, really engaged. They just want to say that they have read my book and liked it.

I've spoken in every state in the union, meeting and hugging the people who later bought my books. I spoke to anybody who wanted to hear me, including 1,000 nuns who could pay me only with homemade bread.