I do not outline. There are writers I know and count as my friends who certainly do it the other way, but for me, part of the adventure is not knowing how it's going to turn out.
— Joyce Maynard
One life is not enough for me. I want to go lots of places.
I had known there had been a serial killer on Mount Tamalpais, and it felt so incongruous in such a beautiful, peaceful spot.
More than any other setting - more than battlefields or boardrooms or a spaceship headed for intergalactic travel - I'll put my money on the family to provide an endless source of comedy, tragedy and intrigue.
When people ask what I write about, that's what I tell them: 'The drama of human relationships.' I'm not even close to running out of material.
A good home must be made, not bought. In the end, it's not track lighting or a sun room that brings light into a kitchen.
Women writers have been told, forever, that our stories were not valuable. Not as valuable as men's stories about wars, business, power.
The portrait of my parents is a complicated one, but lovingly drawn.
Nothing like being visible, publishing one's work, and speaking openly about one's life, to disabuse the world of the illusion of one's perfection and purity.
Many women my age have known the experience of giving up crucial parts of themselves to please the man they love.
If I told you about all the stories I don't tell, I would be violating the very boundaries I set for myself.
I have long observed that the act of writing is viewed, by some, as an elite and otherworldly act, all the more so if a person isn't paid for what she writes.
I believed my story would be helpful to young women my daughter's age, who are still in the process of forming themselves as women, and in need of encouragement to remain true to themselves.
At Home in the World is the story of a young woman, raised in some difficult circumstances, and how she survives. It tells a story of redemption, not victimhood.
The vehemence with which certain critics have chosen not simply to criticize what I've written, but to challenge my writing this story at all, speaks of what the book is about: fear of disapproval.
The big dramas that fascinate me are the quiet ones that happen behind closed doors in so-called ordinary families.
The process of writing has always started for me when I put myself in a place where no one distracts me.
You write about what you know, and you write about what you want to know.
I think of myself as a realistic writer, not a creator of soap opera or melodrama.
I was giving a speech one time, and the woman who introduced me said, 'Well, she used to be J. D. Salinger's girlfriend. I thought, 'God, is that all I've been?' I didn't want to be reduced to that.
It troubles me that people speak about writing for money as ugly and distasteful.
To share our stories is not only a worthwhile endeavor for the storyteller, but for those who hear our stories and feel less alone because of it.
The painter who feels obligated to depict his subjects as uniformly beautiful or handsome and without flaws will fall short of making art.
Not only did I avoid speaking of Salinger; I resisted thinking about him. I did not reread his letters to me. The experience had been too painful.
Long after Salinger sent me away, I continued to believe his standards and expectations were the best ones.
If a man wishes to truly not be written about, he would do well not to write letters to 18-year-old girls, inviting them into his life.
I continued to protect him with my silence.
I believe every one of us possesses a fundamental right to tell our own story.
Although Salinger had long since cut me out of his life completely and made it plain that he had nothing but contempt for me, the thought of becoming the object of his wrath was more than I felt ready to take on.
It's not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can't tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself.
I've had some wonderful successes and some extreme disappointments in my career and my life.
There is a theme that runs through my work, and that is: the toxic property of keeping secrets.
Those who rhapsodize about the ease and joy of childhood have perhaps forgotten what it's like to be 12 years old.
Growing up in the fifties and sixties, I can only remember knowing one child, ever, whose parents got a divorce, and hardly any whose mother 'worked' at anything besides raising her children.
If people choose to live their life in a way that does not confront the more troubling aspects of their experience, that's fine, if it works for them. But it will probably make them uncomfortable if they come up against somebody like me. So they just shouldn't! They shouldn't read my work!
Teach a child to play solitaire, and she'll be able to entertain herself when there's no one around. Teach her tennis, and she'll know what to do when she's on a court. But raise her to feel comfortable in nature, and the whole planet is her home.
The silence was part of the story I wanted to tell.
Some literary types subscribe to the notion that being a writer like Salinger entitles a person to remain free of the standards that might apply to mere mortals.
My job is writing. I get paid to do it. When was the last time you heard someone challenge a doctor for making money off of cancer?
It is not the task of a reader to please her subjects.
I wonder what it is that the people who criticize me for telling this story truly object to: is it that I have dared to tell the story? Or that the story turns out not to be the one they wanted to hear?
I compromised my ability to tell my story, at the most basic level.
For 25 years, I did take my responsibilities as a pleaser of others sufficiently seriously.
A person who deserves my loyalty receives it.
