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Laura Lippman Quotes

Powerful Laura Lippman for Daily Growth

In my newspaper days, your endings could be literally sliced off in the composing room, so it was dangerous to get attached to them. Yet I think this has made me work harder on endings in fiction.

- Laura Lippman

Newspaper, Fiction, I Think, Sliced

I've gotten to do a lot of stuff, traveled, worked hard at my career.

- Laura Lippman

Career, Lot, Worked, Traveled

I think Baltimore suffers from nostalgia and it keeps us from being honest in talking about what really happened here. A place doesn't have to be perfect to be beloved, and I love this city and I love it better for seeing its flaws.

- Laura Lippman

Love, Here, I Think, Flaws

If I waited to be inspired to go to the gym, I'd never get there. I schedule my exercise time; I schedule my work time. This is especially important if you have a day job as I did while writing my first seven novels.

- Laura Lippman

Exercise, Seven, While, Waited

People still struggle with this notion of gifted writers somehow being in touch with a higher power, but it's all about showing up and doing the job, meeting deadlines, working hard.

- Laura Lippman

Doing, Deadlines, About, Showing Up

Edward Eager wrote a series of children's books that are in danger of being forgotten. But they're divine: stories about ordinary kids who stumble on magical things - a coin, a lake, a book, a thyme garden, a well. The magic changes them, they try to change the magic, the magic moves on.

- Laura Lippman

Magic, Stumble, Eager, Lake

For me, crime fiction was an opportunity to sneak up on readers with social issues, something they won't go out of their way to seek.

- Laura Lippman

Go, Fiction, Social, Social Issues

It doesn't feel like work. Yes, I have days that are difficult, but I'm sitting in a chair making up stories. It's what I did for fun as a kid, whether with Barbies or stuffed animals.

- Laura Lippman

Making, Like, Stories, Making Up

I've long believed that the work-out life has lessons for the writing life. I've 'solved' a lot of books while at the gym, in part because I'm not trying to solve them at that precise moment.

- Laura Lippman

Part, Them, Solved, Precise

I don't know where my phone is half the time.

- Laura Lippman

Know, Phone, Half, Half The Time

I was part of a generation where kids had a lot of freedom and aimless downtime. I had no scheduled after-school activities. As long as you came home for dinner, everything was fine.

- Laura Lippman

Generation, Part, Aimless, After-School

Writing is a sedentary gig unless one has a treadmill desk. But I have long believed writing and working out are complementary disciplines.

- Laura Lippman

Long, Gig, Sedentary, Complementary

Baltimore has been a punchline/punching bag for years - I've landed a few blows, to be fair - but those old jokes are out of touch.

- Laura Lippman

Old, Baltimore, Been, Jokes

Writers who don't read can't write well. It's that simple. The more you read, the better you read, the better you'll write. The upside is that you can't read too much, and even 'junk' reading can be constructive.

- Laura Lippman

Reading, More, Read, Junk

I'm very empathetic - that might be one of my superpowers.

- Laura Lippman

Might, Superpowers, Very, Empathetic

I'm at the age most people are sending their kids off to college.

- Laura Lippman

College, People, Most, Sending

After I started writing crime fiction, I said to myself, 'I may be limited, but the genre's not. There's no reason to change genres if I'm happy writing what I write.' And I am.

- Laura Lippman

Reason, May, I Write, No Reason

Anyone can love a perfect place. Loving Baltimore takes some resilience.

- Laura Lippman

Love, Loving, Some, Resilience

The verbs that are used for people who write quickly are almost never flattering.

- Laura Lippman

Never, Quickly, Almost, Verbs

I spent grades one through nine in Baltimore City, leaving for reasons that had nothing to do with the quality of education I was receiving.

- Laura Lippman

Through, Nine, Reasons, Receiving

My reading life is like an airport where a bunch of planes circle in a holding pattern, then - boom, boom, boom - several come in for a landing.

- Laura Lippman

Pattern, Like, Boom, Planes

I like books steeped in the quotidian - details about work and place. You can learn how to run a chicken-and-waffle restaurant by reading 'Mildred Pierce.' And I like fiction about money.

- Laura Lippman

Learn, Fiction, Like, Details

I think I'm part of a generation of crime writers all of whom woke up independently and recoiled with horror at the fact that we'd chosen this very conservative genre.

- Laura Lippman

Generation, Think, Very, Chosen

My husband, David Simon, and I make our livings using our imaginations.

- Laura Lippman

Husband, Using, Simon, Imaginations

I never knew how passive-aggressive people could be until I became a parent. Or even aggressive-aggressive. It actually began before I had a child. A relative asked me out to lunch and told me I was too old for motherhood.

- Laura Lippman

Lunch, Parent, Became, Motherhood

I love crime fiction, and I'm proud to be part of it, but I'm not without criticism for my own genre.

- Laura Lippman

Love, Proud, Fiction, Criticism

Fiction needs writers and readers, and writers should cultivate both.

- Laura Lippman

Fiction, Needs, Readers, Cultivate

My husband and I are both proud public school graduates.

- Laura Lippman

School, Proud, Public, Graduates

I sometimes allow people to infer that I'm much less successful than I am.

- Laura Lippman

I Am, Sometimes, Allow, Infer

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