"I think I write to a concept more than to plot points. So I try to figure out who my characters are and what they're going to learn about themselves by the end of the story.”

— Kelly Jamieson

"Instead of just telling people about the past, I like to show it to them.”

— Aleatha Romig

"If I had to say that there was one thing that defines my writing, it would be that my heroines are really strong characters.”

— Sawyer Bennett

"It took a little convincing—and maybe some bribing—but he finally came over to the dark side.”

Erica Russikoff — She Said, He Said

"I want to do a long view of what different situations look like to different characters.

I write a lot of stuff that’s just one character’s perspective, but I always still go through the process of looking at how everybody else in the book sees that experience and sees that character.”

— Bryn Greenwood

"This guy just walked into my head. I had to write it. I was like, "Oh, my God"—I was obsessed. But I wasn't going to publish it, I just wanted to get it out.”

— Ella Fields

"...Sometimes if I get stuck writing a character, I will sort of get inside their head and write some poetry from their point of view, and it just helps me, you know, define who they are and what they want...”

— Leisa Rayven

"Once you get to know your characters, they like to take the story in a different direction sometimes...I find that fighting my characters is an effort in futility.”

— Penny Reid

"We’re not very good plotters. We basically know maybe one page of stuff when we start. We’ll know maybe what the twist is, what we’re building towards, and kind of who the characters are … then we just basically start writing.”

— Vi Keeland

"Over the course of writing this book I ended up finding a therapist and saying things out loud that I had never said in my entire life...just so I could write this book! So I have to tell you, the amount of relief that I have written it, and it is done, is incredible.”

— Skye Warren