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" The process is different for every book, but there are similarities. I always draw from the inside out. I don't plot them ahead of time, and I'm always surprised by things that happen in my books. "

Elizabeth Berg

Ahead

Time

Process

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" I've been to Iowa many times before. You have to love Iowa, or you're not an American. "

" Really, my sacred place is my study where there are books that I love and things that people have given me. "

" Oftentimes, I need to write about something in order to understand it. "

" Never try to copy other writers, and never try to have a formula. It has to come from your heart and soul. "

" As for the notion that everything has already been said, maybe it has, but life is like meatloaf: there are so many different ways to present it. "

Elizabeth Berg

Present

Said

" We're not just writers; we're readers probably more than anything else. That's how you learn how to write and how you learn to appreciate good writing: by reading. "

" We're such imperfect beings. I think that's more often the case than not. "

" In this wide world, I don't think that there's just one person for any of us. I think we look until we find one that feels right, and oftentimes, it works out just fine. "

" I'm nuts about the South - the people, the language, the food, the land, the stories and writers that come from there - but it's hard to know whether I'll use it as a location again. "

" Life is so fragile, so brief. And we seemingly work so hard at trying to ignore that. "

" People don't take you seriously, so you have to take yourself seriously. "

" You need a place to work that works for you, and you need people to understand that when you are writing, you are doing a rarefied type of brain surgery and therefore should not be subject to a million random interruptions. "

" In writing a novel about George Sand, I hoped to present her as the talented, beguiling, complicated and occasionally infuriating woman I think she was, but I hope, too, that readers will enjoy the people she surrounded herself with. "

" I like my house to feel like a place where I can just lie back and say, 'Ahhhhh, I'm home.' "

" It feels like my books come true. I write these things, and then they kind of end up happening. I wasn't divorced, for example, when I wrote a book about divorce. "

Elizabeth Berg

Kind

Book

" As a child, I saw my mother prepare for Christmas every year, and it never occurred to me that labor was involved. I thought it was my mother's joy and privilege to hang tinsel on the tree strand by strand, to make sure that every room in the house had a touch of Christmas, down to the Santa-themed rug and hand towels in the bathroom. "

Elizabeth Berg

Thought

Mother

" When I lived in Boston, I had an office that I rented because I found it wonderful to go away from my house to work: It was so quiet, and I couldn't go to the refrigerator or do the laundry. "

Elizabeth Berg

Work

Boston

" It usually takes about a year to write each book. I don't plan it that way. I don't set deadlines. If a book wants to take longer, it can. "

" When you've written long enough, you see that there's a common theme in your work. "

" Writing is, of course, a solitary occupation. But for many writers, myself included, it's through writing that we make certain vital connections. "

" It is one thing to see your friend dance around a table when she's 25, quite another thing to see her doing it when she's 62. "

" My mom used to keep all her Christmas cards in a basket bedecked with red ribbon, and I loved to look at them all and read all the letters. "

" If I could visit dead authors, I'd head right over to E. B. White, though I'm so in awe of him I'd probably just sit at his feet and weep. He's the master of clarity, of understated humor, of palatable political conviction. "

" I never was a big believer that you can teach writing per se. "

" The friends in my real life do tend to be smart and funny and creative. I am lucky! "

" For me as a writer, it's so joyful to know that someone hears and responds to what I write. "

" Writers have a reputation for being distracted. That's because writers are distracted. They are always tuned into that other voice, the one in their head that rarely turns off. "

" I remember, as a child, wanting all the time to buy my parents presents. I stood around forlornly in fancy shops, unable to afford a single thing. "

" No, I never thought that I would be a writer. I had always been told I could write well, but it never occurred to me that I might make my living that way. "

Elizabeth Berg

Way

Thought

" If I don't feel like writing on a certain day, I just go to the cafe and hang around. "