Quotes That Might Save You—or At Least Comfort You While You Write By Maddie Dawson

Maddie Dawson is the bestselling author of eight novels about love, crazy families, secrets, parenthood, and–yes, they have reasonably happy endings. Kind of like life. Her newest, A Happy Catastrophe, was released on May 25, 2020.  We’re delighted to feature her today! 

Quotes That Might Save You—or At Least Comfort You While You Write

By Maddie Dawson

Writing can be a lonely business. Who would choose this on purpose? You pretty much have to sit in a room—you and your characters—and watch the days go by. Sometimes you are furiously typing, sometimes you are pacing while eating instant pudding granules out of the box and weeping, and sometimes—sometimes!—you are actually typing brilliant, lovely scenes that are blossoming beneath your fingertips. (Scenes that you later might delete because you discover they have no place in your book, but never mind that.)

What do you need during this process—besides psychotherapy, chocolate, and the blind determination to keep going? Quotations! Quotations about writing are to me a kind of reassurance and affirmation that—no, I’m not crazy, and anyway, if I am crazy, I’m in good company. Here are some of my favorite quotes:

“Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.” – E.L. Doctorow

 “I came to believe I could make a living as a storyteller after realizing how much time and money I had spent waiting for my therapist to stop laughing.” – Spalding Gray

“If I weren’t a novelist, the thing I would most like to do is build dioramas. I was one of those kids who built little worlds in shoeboxes. That’s basically what novel writing is. You get to build every tree, every person, put them all in place, and decide when the sun comes up and goes down. That I can make a living at that is astonishing.” – Ann Patchett

 “How a novel finishes is there’s a moment when you know it has problems, and you don’t know how to fix them. That’s when you’re done.” – Lorrie Moore

“If you promise a story inside you that you’ll tell it, the best you can, then just start anywhere. It’ll join you, like a quiet caseworker.” – Anne Lamott

“We are pattern makers, and if our patterns are beautiful and full of grace they will be able to bring a person for whom the world has become broken and disorganized up off his knees and back to life.’’ – Pam Houston

“I decided it was okay to try and fail; not okay to fail to try.”—Hallie Ephron

“Finish the damn book.”—Laura Lippman

“You can always edit garbage. You can’t edit a blank page.”—Jodi Piccoult

“I write pieces, and move them around. And the fun of it is watching the truthful parts slide together. What is false won’t fit.” – Elizabeth Strout

“If you don’t write your books, nobody else will do it for you. No one else has lived your life.” – Jose Saramago

 “I like the part of being a writer in which you don’t feel the sides of anything. You don’t see the beginning, and you don’t see the end, you’re just in it.” – Richard Ford

“Every first draft is perfect, because all a first draft has to do is exist.”—Jane Smiley

“Being a good writer is 3 % talent, 97% not being distracted by the Internet.”—Anonymous

“All good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald

“So, simply then, here is my formula.  What do you want more than anything else in the world?  What do you love, or what do you hate?  Find a character, like yourself, who will want something or not want something, with all his heart.  Give him running orders.  Shoot him off.  Then follow as fast as you can go.  The character, in his great love, or hate, will rush you through to the end of the story.” – Ray Bradbury

“I write because I want more than one life; I insist on a wider selection. It’s greed, plain and simple. When my characters join the circus, I’m joining the circus. Although I’m happily married, I spent a great deal of time mentally living with incompatible husbands.”
― Anne Tyler 

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A HAPPY CATASTROPHE, Maddie Dawson

From the bestselling author of Matchmaking for Beginners comes a novel about love, loss, and the beautiful mess of family.

Marnie MacGraw and Patrick Delaney have been in love for a few years now, enough to realize that they are imperfectly perfect together. Still, there are some things that maybe need a little attention. Marnie’s ebullient; he’s brooding. She thrives on change; he prefers stability. She sees marriage and parenthood in their future, but he can’t see beyond the shadow of an earlier tragedy.

Then an eight-year-old surprise from Patrick’s past shows up on their doorstep, cartwheeling into their lives and spinning things in all directions. While it’s not exactly the change she envisioned, it looks like instant family to Marnie. But Patrick, afraid of being hurt again, retreats further into himself. Suddenly, two very different pieces of a beautiful puzzle find it harder and harder to fit. How can Marnie trust in the magic of the universe when it seems to be doing its best to knock her off her feet?

But some love stories are worth waiting for. And what’s love without a little chaos anyway?

“Dawson has created a truly quirky story, filled with a little bit of magic (think unicorn glitter and sparkles) and a lot of love…An optimistic, feel-good story that celebrates love, community, goodness, and the creation of family, however it might appear.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Alive with action, compelling and evolving characters, and screwball comedy, Dawson’s latest will appeal to readers looking for a story that is both pleasurable and substantial. Personal growth is achieved by overcoming obstacles, and the ending is honest and satisfying.” —Booklist

“A triumphant tale about the redemptive magic of love—and the way life sometimes drags us through the muck before giving us what we never knew we wanted. Marnie is one of the most delightful heroines in contemporary fiction, and you won’t want to miss her!” —Kerry Anne King, bestselling author of Whisper Me This

BUY THE BOOK HERE

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Category: Contemporary Women Writers, How To and Tips