Betsy Lerner

“[I]t's the child writer who has figured out, early on, that writing is about saving your soul.”

— Betsy Lerner

No matter how many compromises were made along the way, no matter what happens in the future, a book is a thing…

— Betsy Lerner

Indeed, the great paradox of the writer's life is how much time he spends alone trying to connect with other people.

— Betsy Lerner

“Just remember that this relationship is based on mutual trust and respect, so never reveal your true self.”

— Betsy Lerner

“It was a miracle to me, this transformation of my acorns into an oak.”

— Betsy Lerner

“What I want to know it whether we're supposed to change or just accept who we are?”

— Betsy Lerner

“My mother is always eager to talk when I come over, as if she were a famous actress and I am Diane…

— Betsy Lerner

“Nothing was a more powerful compass of my mood or a better indication of my self-worth than the number on the scale.”

— Betsy Lerner

Asking for advice about what you should write is a little like asking for help getting dressed. I can you tell you…

— Betsy Lerner

... but every person who does serious time with a keyboard is attempting to translate his version of the world into words…

— Betsy Lerner

The world doesn't fully make sense until the writer has secured his version of it on the page. And the act of…

— Betsy Lerner

“For the writer who truly loves language, a trip to the copy editor is like a week at a spa. You come…

— Betsy Lerner

“I hadn't been able to trust since the age of four. I was torn between wanting to be cradled and telling the…

— Betsy Lerner

“All writers are like bomb-throwers, whether they attack with dense academic prose or jazzy riffs of stream-of-consciousness writing.”

— Betsy Lerner

Fear of failure is the reason most often cited to explain why so many aspiring writers never realize their dreams. But I…

— Betsy Lerner

I wondered if I was just the sum of my brain scan, little dots clustered in my frontal lobe. Is that where…

— Betsy Lerner

But I also believe there is enormous value in the piece of writing that goes no further than the one person for…

— Betsy Lerner

“I remember watching my mother emerge from her bedroom on a night when she and my father were going out, all dressed…

— Betsy Lerner

When an editor works with an author, she cannot help seeing into the medicine cabinet of his soul. All the terrible emotions,…

— Betsy Lerner

In discovering books, you became free to explore the full range of human motives, desires, secrets, and lies. All my life, people…

— Betsy Lerner

I wondered if I was just the sum of my brain scan, little dots clustered in my frontal lobe. Is that where…

— Betsy Lerner

Tomorrow, I am fifty-two years old. And I want to say unequivocally that I am very happy to be alive, that being…

— Betsy Lerner

The world doesn’t fully make sense until the writer has secured his version of it on the page. And the act of…

— Betsy Lerner

“For most writers, reading is also a very intense experience; they don’t read so much as compete. The writer measure’s himself against…

— Betsy Lerner

“I had officially joined the cacophony of sick mother fuckers.”

— Betsy Lerner

But editors are still the world's readers. And thus the eyes of the world.

— Betsy Lerner

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change. The courage to change the things I can. And…

— Betsy Lerner

The writer labors in isolation, yet all that intensive, lonely work is in the service of communicating, is an attempt to reach…

— Betsy Lerner