Book Themes Quotes

One of the most fun things for me, as a writer, is when readers ask questions like, 'Oh, I noticed that you have a lot of water and baptism imagery in your book. Did you do that on purpose?'

Bent Literary Agency had a Q&A on Twitter, and I took a chance and asked if the Black Lives Matter movement was an appropriate topic for a YA novel. Brooks Sherman, who is now my agent, responded that he didn't think any topics were inappropriate for YA. I remember being so terrified even just sending the tweet.

Just like all my novels, 'Illusion' is a good way to observe where Frank Peretti was in his life when he wrote it.

But you cannot expect every writer to dwell on human suffering. I think my books do deal with grave issues. People who say they are too positive probably haven't read them.

Most of my books have something to do with L.A.

I would love to focus on writing books that were not just about issues.

It is possible to say that all of my books concern themselves with the notion of what it means to be female - whether it is in New York City in 2000 or Calcutta in 1836. In that way, my books really are the same.

'Fast Food Nation' isn't about my journey into the dark world of fast food and the prison book is not about my journey into the prison world. I'm not using myself as any kind of narrative link.

I've been a big music guy for a long time and a lot of my books have music in them so I like music analogies.

My books are so tame!

All of my books really do look at that to degrees of difference. Technically, I do enjoy the flashback! But not just for informational material.

Fiction is able to encompass books that are bleak and which dwell on the manifold and terrible problems of our times. But I don't think that all books need to have that particular focus.

'Get Skinny' is my sixth book. I look over the books that I've written, and my subject matters are varied, and I write books pertaining to that which I'm dealing with at the moment.

I think books that are meant to be read in the nighttime ought to confront the very fears that we're trying to think about.

What I think of sometimes, as I read the new books - do kids really need to see such a seamy side of life? I'm in the minority, such an old woman, perhaps. I love the books that have given kids joy, that give them hope at the end. Sometimes it seems to me the books right now are very depressive.

In my books the technology that I choose to talk about has to serve the themes. What that means is that I end up having to cut out a lot of cool technology that would be really fun to describe and play with, but which would just confuse everybody. So in 'Amped,' I focus on neural implants.

I just have mysteries in all my books, I think, whether it's a boy investigating or a girl. I have an enduring fascination with mysteries of all kinds.

I feel like there's so much darkness in all of my books.

I want readers turning pages until three o'clock in the morning. I want the themes of books to stick around for a reader. I'm always trying to find a way to balance characters and theme.

I don't plan ahead; each book finds me. History itself, the resonance of the past with the present, is the common denominator in all of them.

There are a lot of bars and shoe stores in my early books.

One thing you can't intend is how you will be read. I hear it said a lot that my books are about the 'search for identity', and this is said admiringly, as if I meant to encourage such a search.

More generally, I made an effort to leave out things that weren't relevant to the main narrative themes of the book, namely that there were two sides to Steve Jobs: the romantic, poetic, countercultural rebel on one side, and the serious businessperson on the other.

From 'Trainspotting' to 'Acid House,' I moved from urban realism into fantasy.

I'm not surprised that my books appeal to adults.