Lynn Abbey

“Ideas aren't magical; the only tricky part is holding on to one long enough to get it written down.”

“When I have an idea, it goes from vague, cloudy notion to 100,000 words in a heartbeat.”

“I'm dense when it comes to discouragement.”

“I've read short stories that are as dense as a 19th century novel and novels that really are short stories filled with a lot of helium.”

“I think my prose reads as if English were my second language. By the time I get to the end of a paragraph, I'm dodging bullets and gasping for breath.”

“When I'm not writing or tweaking my computer, I do embroidery. When I'm not plunging into the past, tweaking, or embroidering, I'm reading books about history, computers, or embroidery.”

“No one uses a ribbon typewriter any more, but your final draft is not the time to try to wring a few more sheets out of your inkjet cartridge.”

“I write sets of books, but I've also written a lot of orphans.”

“A good short-story writer has an instinct for sketching in just enough background to ground the specific story.”

“It's been a long time since I've written old-fashioned sword and sorcery; I'm hoping it's like riding a bicycle.”

“Editors of open anthologies actively seek submissions from all comers, established and unknown. They are willing to read whatever the tide washes up at their feet.”

“One of my great passions is the collection of historical trivia.”

“I'm always trolling for trivia.”

“Ideas aren't magical; the only tricky part is holding on to one long enough to get it written down.”