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" I simply don't understand authors that know everything before they write it; it seems so cold blooded. I think it's lovely when the story takes over and goes somewhere else. "

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" I read hugely as a child, but I slowed up when the print got smaller. I am a very slow reader. I don't know why. Maybe it is like some people chewing their food for ages and some wolfing it down. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Slow

I Am

Child

" I like working in children's books because it gives rise to such a variety of jobs. One month it may be a picture book, the next a retelling, the next a play, a short story or the start of the next novel. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Children

Book

Story

" Never apologise for not being someone else. You're bound to find something you're good at, even if it's only writing stories. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Never

Find

Good

" My brother, whom I adored, typed out a children's book illustrated by himself... at the age of 14. My sister, with whom I always shared a double bed, had that effortless superiority of someone six years older and anxious to show it. But we were each as shy as voles. It seemed safer to keep to each other's company. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Sister

Age

Book

" 'Would I mind if someone wrote a sequel to one of my books?' I asked myself, and I decided that I wouldn't, providing that the writer was respectful, had read my book first, and wasn't drunk when doing it. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Myself

Doing

Books

" I had a very happy childhood, but I still used my imagination as a leisure resort. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Happy

Imagination

Childhood

" I'm not one of those people who had a burning passion for 'Peter Pan' all my life. Although I can't remember a time when I didn't know the story, I didn't carry around with me an ambition to one day write the sequel. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Life

Passion

Day

" The one thing that makes writing a better pastime than reading is that you can make things turn out the way you want in the end! "

Geraldine McCaughrean

End

Reading

Writing

" You sort of suspect if a book's fun to write, it will be fun to read. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Suspect

Will

Book

" I always thought writer's block was something that prats used as an easy excuse for not doing any work. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Doing

Easy

Work

" I still keep thinking someone will penetrate my guilty secret - that I have been masquerading as a writer all these years while all I was really doing was enjoying myself, pursuing my passion. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Doing

Guilty

Myself

" Well, unfortunately, my father passed away before my first book was published, so he never lived to see me as an author. But I think my mum was suitably pleased because she was mad about words. If she ever came across a word that she didn't know, she would always look it up in the dictionary. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Know

Book

Words

" Writing is writing to me. I'm incapable of saying no to any writing job, so I've done everything - historical fiction, myths, fairy tales, anything that anybody expresses any interest in me writing, I'll write. It's the same reason I used to read as a child: I like going somewhere else and being someone else. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Job

Done

Child

" I never dreamt I could be an author when I grew up. It just didn't occur to me, because I thought you had to be a) academic, so go to university, things like that, and I didn't think I was clever, or b) dead because I just assumed all the authors in the library were dead. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Library

You

Thought

" My mum used to tell me to never boil my cabbages twice, and I think it's artistically valid. While I do find myself on similar themes in my books, I try not to repeat myself, and that's something which is all too easy to do in series books. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Find

Myself

Think

" You need to be able to climb into a narrative and zip it up under your chin. You need to be able to see through the eyes of the hero, smell what he's smelling, hear what he's hearing. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Eyes

Climb

Need

" I wept my way through teaching practice. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Through

Way

Practice

" It isn't that I don't tackle issues; it's just that they're secondary to giving somebody an escape route from the banal routine of everyday life. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Escape

Everyday

Giving

" Most of my central characters lack confidence but overcome their timidity or low self-esteem to win through in the end, so I suppose there is a kind of wish-fulfillment at work. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Kind

Work

Win

" The chief thing is to make children feel good about themselves. They want to step into the shoes of a hero who is bigger and stronger, to face tremendous dangers and come home safely for tea. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Shoes

Good

Children

" When people write fan-fic sequels to one of your books, it gives you a very strange feeling. It is very flattering but strange, as if the characters have come to life again without you knowing. "

Geraldine McCaughrean

Life

Feeling

People