The Write Quotes: Storytelling, Inspiration, & Research

These inspirational and practical quotes come from 500+ podcast interviews with hard-working, award-winning, and New York Times bestselling authors in more than 33 U.S. states and five countries.

 

In Book 4, authors share their honest reflections on Storytelling, Inspiration, & Research. 


These quotes reveal how writers tell stories, what inspires them, and how and why research is important to their processes.


Authors quoted include David Baldacci, Steve Berry, Lisa Jewell, John Hart, Sophie Cousens, Ron Rash, C.J. Box, Craig Johnson, Wylie Cash, Brad Taylor, Charlie Lovett, Judy Goldman, Chris Fabry, Amber Smith, Tracy Clark, John Gilstrap, Kimmery Martin, A.J. Hartley, Clyde Edgerton, Jill McCorkle, Jason Mott, Mark de Castrique, Cathy Pickens, David Joy, Gavin Edwards, and many more.

These writers offer insights with humility and responsibility to the craft of storytelling, and in the process, they share gems to guide us along the writing way. Award-winning author Aaron Gwyn says, “There are no stories where characters are just sitting in the recliner.” And Cliff Yeargin, a writer who puts humor in his mysteries, tells us about the essence of storytelling: “Nobody has ever picked up a book and told their friend, on page 271 is one of the greatest sentences I've ever read. They just say, hey, check this book out. It's one dang good story.”

 

But writers often have difficulty explaining where or how their ideas originate. As New York Times bestselling author Ron Rash says, “I don't know where stories come from. I'm kind of a Jungian. I just think they're kind of out there. And it's not so much that we create them as we discover them.” 

 

And when it comes down to it, Nancy Stancill, an award-winning investigative reporter, says, “You're going to need research for most novels because even though novels are made up, there's usually a lot of underpinning of something that really happened.”