Books Quote by Diana Gabaldon

Novels are usually built on conflict, sometimes very, very difficult conflict. It's why men write war novels - because there you go, there's the…

— Anna Quindlen

But novels are never about what they are about; that is, there is always deeper, or more general, significance. The author may not be…

— Diane Johnson

Novels seem to exist because of this need to know and connect, and so story becomes charged with necessity.

— Michael Helm

I always try to create conflict and drama in my books; it's the engine of the novel.

— Monica Ali

I think most novelists I know, certainly including me, feel the novels choose them rather than vice-versa.

— Steve Erickson

That's why I love crime novels so much: When I write a crime novel, the conflict is built in.

— Karin Slaughter

Fiction should be about moral dilemmas that are so bloody difficult that the author doesn't know the answer.

— Pat Barker

I've never really understood that whole thing of writers avoiding other writers' novels while they're working on their own.

— Ned Beauman

What we know about writing the novel is the novel.

— Eudora Welty

Novels function and the power of novels function because of their stories.

— Mohsin Hamid

Ironically, writing a novel is not a way to sort out your confusion.

— Curtis Sittenfeld

It's with bad sentiments that one makes good novels.

— Aldous Huxley