Calling it lunacy makes it easier to explain away the things we don't understand.
People forget that old women were young once, but d'you think we old women forget? In my heart, I'm still thirty.
Sight is one of the most easily deceived senses. I could make a coin disappear and your eyes would believe it gone, even if it were merely up my sleeve.
I know I'm not normal in this, but [ Severus ] Snape is absolutely my favorite character in the Harry Potter books. He is completely mortal - good, bad, strong, weak, motivated by hatred, motivated by love. A gorgeous, compelling, complex character who definitely earns a spot at my table.
All life's a risk, that's what makes it interesting.
The material world is simply an expression of the mind; that's what so many fail to see. We're so dependent on what is before us that we discount our intuition. Yet if one dismisses instinct, how can one understand or believe in a world that exists beyond one's sight?
Logic only tells us what's there; it can't really address what isn't. Even the most devoted empiricist must admit that we have no hope of understanding the universe. Some things are unknowable.
Thematically, we're both [with Kristin Hannah ] interested in women's experiences and women's stories, and until now, you've mostly dealt with how it feels to be a wife/mother/sister/name your poison in today's world. But this story [The Nightingale ] is told from the perspective of two sisters during the German occupation of France in WWII.
In the end, there's only one thing you can believe. Bodies are honest; they don't lie.
The only truth was whatever you could make someone believe.
Impatient men are generous ones. Or haven't you learned that by now?
I know that sounds ineffective and daunting, but it [throw hundreds of pages away] is actually my favorite part of the writing process.
The answers are what they are. Just because you don't like them doesn't mean they aren't true.
You learned to run from what you feel, and that's why you have nightmares. To deny is to invite madness. To accept is to control.
Trying to justify a world we don't hold all the answers to is what bedevils the best of us. Sometimes it's better just to accept that things are as we see them.
I love what I call "re-imagining," where I throw everything up in the air and let it fall in a different way. It's not the most efficient way to write a book, but it's how I find the story.
I am more than happy to invite my five favorite fictional characters. Let's see. First on my list is Sam Gamgee from The Lord of The Rings. Sam is a beautiful character; in him, we find the profound heroism of an ordinary person. He epitomizes the saying that courage isn't not being afraid, courage is going anyway. I just love that.
[I am more than happy to invite my five favorite fictional characters.]Roland Deschain from Stephen King's Dark Tower series. There's a whole world about Roland left to know. I've got questions. He'd have answers. So pour him a glass of wine.
I absolute adore epic journeys that require a protagonist to fight for every victory in the hopes of finding triumph.
Of course, there are hundreds of novels and authors that have influenced me. But to choose three, they are: Stephen King/The Stand (and really most of his books); Anne Rice/The Witching Hour; and Pat Conroy/The Prince of Tides. These authors write my favorite kind of book - epic feel, gorgeous prose, unique characters, and a pace that keeps you turning the pages. From them, I learned a lot about characterization, pacing, prose, voice, and originality.
I think The Nightingale is my best, most mature, most moving novel, but maybe that's just because I love these characters. I love the setting.
I love the idea of ordinary women making extraordinary sacrifices.
I love women being the heroes of the piece. There is just something so dramatic and important about this story [The Nightingale ].
The women of the French Resistance astounded me. Isabelle and Vianne [from The Nightingale] are my homage to those brave and forgotten women.
In doing the research, I found myself consumed by a single, overwhelming question, as relevant today as it was seventy years ago: When would I, as a wife and mother, risk my life - and more importantly, my child's life - to save a stranger? That question is at the very heart of The Nightingale. I hope that everyone who reads the novel will ask themselves the question.
