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" I know some writers can write on the road, but I'm not one of them. "

George R. R. Martin

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" I've never been a fast writer. "

George R. R. Martin

" I have files, I have computer files and, you know, files on paper. But most of it is really in my head. So God help me if anything ever happens to my head! "

George R. R. Martin

" I've never been good with deadlines. My early novels, I wrote by myself. No one knew I was writing a novel; I didn't have a contract. "

George R. R. Martin

" When I'm writing from a character's viewpoint, in essence I become that character; I share their thoughts, I see the world through their eyes and try to feel everything they feel. "

George R. R. Martin

" If I was a soldier going to war, I'd be pretty scared the night before a battle. It's a scary thing. And I want my readers to feel that fear as they turn the page. "

George R. R. Martin

" Nothing bores me more than books where you read two pages and you know exactly how it's going to come out. I want twists and turns that surprise me, characters that have a difficult time and that I don't know if they're going to live or die. "

George R. R. Martin

" There has to be a level of joy of what you're doing. "

George R. R. Martin

" I've written some standalone novels, but a book series allows fans in. There's much more intense involvement. "

George R. R. Martin

" You can have the power to destroy, but it doesn't give you the power to reform, or improve, or build. "

George R. R. Martin

" I have idea files of books that I want to write one of these days, stories I want to write one of these days, but I'll probably never get to them. "

George R. R. Martin

" I tend to write one character at a time. But I don't write the entirety of one character at a time. "

George R. R. Martin

" I have a huge emotional attachment to characters I've created, especially the viewpoint characters. "

George R. R. Martin

" With a book I am the writer and I am also the director and I'm all of the actors and I'm the special effects guy and the lighting technician: I'm all of that. So if it's good or bad, it's all up to me. "

George R. R. Martin

" I had an encyclopedia with a list of flags in the back, so I would look at all these flags of China and Liberia and England and Denmark and whatever, and I learned all the different flags, and I tried to imagine what it would be like to be voyaging on some of these ships. "

George R. R. Martin

" Yes - 90% of fantasy is crap. And so is 90% of science fiction and 90% of mystery fiction and 90% of literary fiction. "

George R. R. Martin

" I wanted to write a big novel, something epic in scale. "

George R. R. Martin

" One of the things I love, and I'm a voracious reader as well as a writer, is books that surprise me, that are not predictable. "

George R. R. Martin

" It's like these ideas, these characters, kind of bubble up inside me, and one day they're not there, and the next day they are there. They're alive, and they're whispering in my head and all that stuff, and I want to write about those things. "

George R. R. Martin

" I prefer to work with grey characters rather than black and white. "

George R. R. Martin

Black And White

" Whenever I switch from one character to another, there's always a few days where I really struggle because I'm changing voices and I'm changing ways of looking at the world. I'm not just flicking a switch; it's harder process than that. "

George R. R. Martin

" I have some other novels I want to write. I have a lot of short stories - I love the short story. "

George R. R. Martin

" If you're going to write about war, which my books are about, wars are nasty things. I think it's sort of a cheap, easy way out to write a war story in which no one ultimately dies. "

George R. R. Martin

" I have always regarded historical fiction and fantasy as sisters under the skin, two genres separated at birth. "

George R. R. Martin

" As Faulkner says, all of us have the capacity in us for great good and for great evil, for love but also for hate. I wanted to write those kinds of complex character in a fantasy, and not just have all the good people get together to fight the bad guy. "

George R. R. Martin

" I had a couple of friends, but I was mostly the kid with his nose in a book. "

George R. R. Martin

" Start with short stories. After all, if you were taking up rock climbing, you wouldn't start with Mount Everest. So if you're starting fantasy, don't start with a nine-book series. "

George R. R. Martin

" I like grey characters; fantasy for too long has been focused on very stereotypical heroes and villains. "

George R. R. Martin

" Many writers will get a contract by selling chapters and outlines or something like that. I wrote the entire novel, and when it was all finished, I would give it to my agent and say, 'Well, here's a novel; sell it if you can.' And they would do that, and it was good because I never had anyone looking over my shoulder. "

George R. R. Martin

" The success that the Tolkien books had redefined modern fantasy. "

George R. R. Martin

" I wrote six pilots, none of which ever got picked up. When you stop trying, it then it falls in your lap. "

George R. R. Martin