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Fiction Quotes
"In short, superheroes balance the forces of light and dark, rage and serenity, and the sacred and the profane within themselves and from it forge an identity that is powerful and purposeful."
24
"CALVIN:Our hero regains consciousness at the feet of a sarcastic alien."
23
"I tend to resist invitations to interpret my own fiction."
22
"Creating the fictional background for a game world isn't significantly different from creating a background for fiction."
19
"Imminent GM bankruptcy was always fiction, created by Wall Street and the media."
19
"If there were genders to genres, fiction would be unquestionably feminine."
18
"Fiction leaves us so much work to do, allows the individual so much input; you have to see, you have to hear, you have to taste the madeleine, and while you are seemingly passive in your chair, you have to travel."
17
"The good ended happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what fiction means."
17
"A masterpiece of fiction is an original world and as such is not likely to fit the world of the reader."
16
"In camp was found a book, the first of the kind I had ever seen, in which I was made a great hero, slaying Indians by the hundreds."
16
"If you write fiction, you're by yourself. There are certain advantages to that in that you don't have to explain anything to anybody. But when you get in with others who share the loneliness of the whole enterprise, you're not lonely anymore."
16
"When one day an expedition was sent to the spatial coordinates that Voojagig had claimed for the planet they discovered only a small asteroid inhabited by a solitary old man who claimed repeatedly that nothing was true, though he was later discovered to be lying."
16
"Literary fiction, as a strict genre, is all but dead. Meanwhile, most genres flourish."
16
"Predictions are uttered by prophets (free of charge); by clairvoyants (who usually charge a fee, and are therefore more honored in their day than prophets); and by futurologists (salaried). Prediction is the business of prophets, clairvoyants, and futurologists. It is not the business of novelists. A novelist's business is lying."
15
"Language does not always have to wear a tie and lace-up shoes. The object of fiction isn't grammatical correctness but to make the reader welcome and then tell a story, to make him/her forget, whenever possible, that he/she is reading a story at all."
14
"Vampires did not avoid mirrors because they cast no reflection but because mirrors became so unflattering with the illusion of fuzzy focus wrenched away."
14
"People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy."
13
"If it's fiction, then it better be true."
13
"Rules such as "Write what you know," and "Show, don't tell," while doubtlessly grounded in good sense, can be ignored with impunity by any novelist nimble enough to get away with it. There is, in fact, only one rule in writing fiction: Whatever works, works."
12
"That dress makes me want to do bad things to you." There was a long pause in which her sweet honeysuckle scent grew, twisting around him. Finally she spoke, her voice low. "What kinds of things?"
12
"A man walked across the moors from Razorback to Lancre town without seeing a single marshlight, head-less dog, strolling tree, ghostly coach or comet, and had to be taken in by a tavern and given a drink to unsteady his nerves."
12
"What I'd show you is much more bizarre than anything we have looked at so far, and I warn you in advance that the first impulse will be to laugh. That's all right. Laugh if you must. Just don't take your eye off what you see, for even in your imagination, here is a creature who can do you damage."
12
"We'd read about sirens in English this fall; Greek mythology bullshit about women so beautiful, their voices so enchanting, that men did anything for them. Turned out that mythology crap was real because every time I saw her, I lost my mind."
11
"A merry little surge of electricity piped by automatic alarm from the mood organ beside his bed awakened Rick Deckard."
11
"Fiction was invented the day Jonah arrived home and told his wife that he was three days late because he had been swallowed by a whale.."
11
"Science fiction, to me, has not only things that wouldn't happen, but other planets."
11
"Are you naked?" he rasped out. Swallowing hard, she nodded."
10
"The alien in my uncle hand obviously taken full control. Soon, it would claw its way out of his stomach and tap dance across my bed."
10
"An Assassin, a real Assassin, had to look like one - black clothes, hood, boots, and all. If they could wear any clothes, any disguise, then what could anyone do but spend all day in a small room with a loaded crossbow pointed at the door?"
10
"If you are writing fiction, think like a god. Release all the power of your imagination; create worlds and destroy them at your will, create as many miracles as your story needs."
10
"With his supernatural vision he immediately spotted Rhea sitting near the shoreline, her legs stretched out in front of her. Unfortunately she had on clothing. Not that he'd expected her to be naked. Still, a dragon could dream.... After shifting to his human form he let his camouflage drop and headed toward her. Naked. He held onto his clothes, but didn't bother to put them on as he stalked across the sand. Nudity was no big deal to shifters but normally he clothed himself in front of females in socially appropriate situations. Now, the most primal part of him wanted Rhea to see all of him. To see what he had to offer her."
10
"There are people who think that things that happen in fiction do not really happen. These people are wrong."
10
"Novelists are basically inviting their readers to play a game of pretend. That's what fiction is: a game of pretend."
9
"You can't burn down a made-up place."
9
"You're much shorter than my mom.""Brat," she said, surprised into a giggle."That's no way to talk to a vampire.""Bloodsucking brat.""Better" he said."
9
"I write fiction""What's fiction?""Fiction is an improvement on life."
9
"She even tried the one which every romantic nerve in her body insisted should work, which consisted of theatrically giving up, sitting down, and letting her glance fall naturally on a patch of earth which, if she had been in any decent narrative, should have contained the book.It didn't."
9
"Oh my God, you're such a guy!" "I'm glad you noticed." The glint in his dark eyes was purely wicked."
9
"One thing I've learned about vampires--they keep pulling new rabbits out of their cloaks. Big, fanged, carnivorous bunnies that'll eat your eyeballs if you're not paying attention."
9
"I could almost hear the characters inside, murmuring and jostling, impatient for me to open the cover and let them out."
9
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