Quotes By Laurell K. Hamilton

You give the reader a sense of a full meal.

Like most creative people I don't fit well into boxes.

I think that my vampires in general were influenced by my being allowed to watch the Hammer vampire films. Vampire Circus, also shown as Circus of Fear, was one of those movies.

I try not to worry about rewriting books that worked well the first time. I'm too busy writing new books to worry about things that are already in print.

When sex is necessary for the plot of a book, or a character development, then I don't shy away from it. Why should I?

Now that I'm being very successful, publishers are trying to mainstream me, but I'm unabashedly genre. It's what I like to read, what I like to write.

Never argue with your characters; they know themselves better than you do.

Most of the monsters... are based on some sort of mythology. Every culture and even some geographical areas have monsters and mythology that is their own.

I always treated writing as a profession, never as a hobby. If you don't believe in yourself, no one else will.

I'm more influenced by my own interests than anyone else's. Writers have to entertain themselves, or they can't entertain anyone else.

Two things I do well in books are sex and violence, but I don't want gratuitous sex or violence. The sex and violence are only as graphic as need be. And never included unless it furthers the plot or character development.

I guess, what I'm saying is that when I've been this surprised by my own characters and world, all bets are off.

If I'd been easily discouraged, I could have been a one-hit wonder.

I want a kiss to be so believable it gives the reader shivers.

You'd think a sociopath assassin wouldn't have a fan following but he does.

I cannot say how strongly I object to people using other people's writing as research. Research is non-fiction, especially for horror, fantasy, science fiction. Do not take your research from other people's fiction. Just don't.

My writing style is very sensual, as in sensory detail.

I am a very linear thinker, so I write beginning to end. I write hundreds of pages per book that never make it into print.

I like conventions. I like meeting and greeting. I'm perched on that edge where I'm getting more attention than I quite know what to do with, though.

For me the Anita series is built like a mystery series, which means that as much as possible each book stands alone, so you have a mystery to solve from the beginning to the end of the book.

I am not a morning person.

If you're open to it, New Orleans will teach you about yourself, but if you want to hide from who you really are, the city will help you do that, too.

I went to Marion College for writing and I was kicked out of the writing school. I was asked to leave the writing program because I was corrupting the other students.

I love animals, always have, and it seemed natural to help the ASPCA. Animals have no voice of their own, so we have to be that voice.

I'm not terribly fond of soapboxes.

Perfection is an unattainable goal. It isn't going to be perfect. Just get words down on paper, and when you stumble to what you think is the end of the book, you will have hundreds of pages of words that came out of your head. It may not be perfect, but it looks like a book.

Here's the secret to finishing that first book. Don't rewrite as you go.

I've lost track of the number of people who want to be writers but never actually write anything. Talking about writing, dreaming about writing, can be very fun, but it won't get a book written. You've got to write.

If people would write exactly what I wanted to read I wouldn't feel so compelled to write myself.

Everyone spends their lives trying to balance their world between good and evil.