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" Everyone has his own sound. I'm not going to presume how to tell anybody how to write. "

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" I think the best advice I give is to try not to write. Try not to overwrite, try not to make it sound too good. Just use your own voice. Use your own style of putting it down. "

" I have fun writing. I don't make it a chore. I don't have to struggle with it. "

" There are some people who have been reading me for years, and they keep saying kind things about the writing. That's what you're writing for, to get people to respond to it. "

" I never know what I'm going to write next. If I'm still writing the book but I'm very near the end, and I begin to think of what I'd like to do next, then I'll know that what I'm writing is in hand. I'll think of an ending and it will be fine. "

" To me, a book is a book, an electronic device is not, and love of books was the reason I started writing. "

" I got halfway through 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.' I don't get it at all. What's the big thrill? It's boring. "

" I really - I don't take my work that seriously, and I think that's what keeps me loose. If I try to write, if I catch myself trying to write, I'll fall right on my face. I'll see it. If I see in the prose that I'm - 'Boy, look at me writing,' I rewrite it. I rewrite it because I don't, because I think it's distracting. "

" I can write anywhere. But I don't use a computer, and I could never write on a laptop. I hate the sound of computers; it's too dull, like it's not doing anything for you. "

" I'm not going to write for posterity. I'm going to write to make a buck. "

" I'm not aware of a cadence when writing, but I hear it after. I write in longhand, and that helps. You're closer to it, and you have to cross things out. You put a line through it, but it's still there. You might need it. When you erase a line on a computer, it's gone forever. "

" It took me 20 years to buy an electric typewriter, because I was afraid it would be too sensitive. I like to bang the keys. I'm doing action stories, so that's the way I like to do it. "

" I left advertising as fast as I could in 1961. And I haven't ever thought about going back. "

" When I get an idea for a book, something appeals to me, it's usually a character. I'll see a picture of a female marshal in front of the courthouse in Miami and she's got a shotgun on her hip and it goes up on an angle. And she's good-looking. And I say, 'I've got to use her.' "

" I don't have any of the modern stuff. I don't have e-mail. I don't have a computer! "

" A friend of mine who is in the publishing business knew I was writing a book, and he said, 'Have you said anything yet about the good guy? Because I know you spend so much time with the bad guys.' Because they're fun. So then you have to make the good guy fun, in order to compete. That's the challenge. "

" Sometimes female characters start out as the wife or girlfriend, but then I realize, 'No, she's the book,' and she becomes a main character. I surrender the book to her. "

" Never open a book with weather. There are exceptions. If you happen to be Barry Lopez, who has more ways to describe ice and snow than an Eskimo, you can do all the weather reporting you want. "

" Writing on the beach is not what it's cracked up to be. The sand blows, and you perspire, and the page gets all blotty and messed up, so I don't do that anymore. "

" I try to leave out the parts readers skip. "

" I don't want to write any more screenplays, I'll tell you that right now. It's a waste of time. You've got too many people who think they have the answer to a good screenplay and they don't. No one knows. "

" I don't believe in writer's block or waiting for inspiration. If you're a writer, you sit down and write. "

" I don't get in a position to be frightened. I don't do anything dangerous, and I always pay my bills. "

" If I have several bad guys and I only want to end up with one of them, then I have to decide which one I want in the end. And normally it's the one who is the most interesting talker. "

" I think any writer is a fool if he doesn't do it for money. There needs to be some kind of incentive in addition to the project. It all goes together. It's fun to sit there and think of characters and get them into action, then be paid for it. "

" The truth is that the writers who most influenced me weren't people categorized as crime writers. I'd say I learned more from John O'Hara, who isn't much read today but whose short stories I really admired, and Hemingway, who I think has lasted pretty good. "

" I get letters. I get several a week, I think. A lot of people want a picture, a lot of people just want an autograph. "

" Really, when I write a book I'm the only one I have to please. That's the beauty of writing a book instead of a screenplay. "

" I used to be able to write five pages a day, every day, no problem. Now a good day is five or four pages, and that's from 9:30 A.M. until 6 P.M. "

" When you are developing your style, you avoid weaknesses. I am not good at describing things, so I stay away from it. And if anyone is going to describe anything at all, it's going to be from the point of view of the character, because then I can use his voice, and his attitude will be revealed in the way he describes what he sees. "

" The bad guys are the fun guys. The only people I have trouble with are the so-called normal types. Their language isn't very colorful, and they don't talk with any certain sound. "