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Once you publish a book, it is out of your control. You cannot dictate how people read it.

Authors are influenced by everything they've ever read. If you've read widely enough, it helps you create your own mix.

I feel that form determines how readers read a book and how they judge it.

I don't know who said that novelists read the novels of others only to figure out how they are written. I believe it's true. We aren't satisfied with the secrets exposed on the surface of the page: we turn the book around to find the seams.

Personally I don't like it when writers become excessively proscriptive about the way that people read their books.

As a reader, I much prefer to read a book where people embody all kinds of ideas and everybody is making mistakes.

Readers are always surprised to learn that authors have little or no input regarding the cover art for their books.

I know when I go and see a writer, the first thing I think to myself is, 'Are they the character in the book?' You just can't help it; it's the way people are.

I know that books seem like the ultimate thing that's made by one person, but that's not true. Every reading of a book is a collaboration between the reader and the writer who are making the story up together.