A Quote by Jennifer Egan

'Goon Squad' took about three years to write and that's the short end. My second novel, 'Look at Me,' took six years. — © Jennifer Egan
'Goon Squad' took about three years to write and that's the short end. My second novel, 'Look at Me,' took six years.
Goon Squad' took about three years to write and that's the short end. My second novel, 'Look at Me,' took six years.
From beginning to end, the novel [Dissemblers] took about three and a half years to write. I didn't write it chronologically.
My first book took five years to write and I made $1,000 on it. The second took three years and I made $3,000. All this time I was a housewife being supported by a husband. I was very lucky.
I started writing short stories. I tried writing horror, mystery, science fiction. I joined a little critique group here in town and ran my stories past them. After about three years, I tackled my first novel, Subterranean. It took me 11 months to write.
I've been doing short-form writing for a decade, and six years ago I signed with an agent, and we've been working on figuring out what my book would be. I was always so embarrassed that it took me so long to figure it out, but I think, in retrospect, I just wasn't ready to write a book six years ago. I wasn't confident enough as a writer and I wasn't coherent enough in my worldview. It just took this long for me to be a mature enough writer and be ready to do it.
Writing a first novel was an arduous crash course. I learned so much in the six years it took me to write it, mostly technical things pertaining to craft.
I shoplifted. I was about five years old, and I took a candy from a store. We paid for three of them, but I took four, and I went home and cried. My mom took me back, and I paid for the missing piece.
I sat down to try to write 'Edinburgh,' an autobiographical novel, and that took five years to write and two years to sell.
'Senna' took five years, 'Amy' took three years. You try and say, 'Look, there's no deadline.' That's important. Just saying, 'We've got to make the film. And once the film's ready, it will be out there.'
Twenty-five years ago my two main target species were goliath tigerfish and arapaima from the Amazon. Each took me six years to track down and catch, over the course of three expeditions to the Congo and six to the Amazon.
It took me five years on Lyndon Johnson, ten years on the Kennedys, six years on the Roosevelts. Inevitably, you get shaped by the people that you're thinking about during that period of time.
The age of the book is not over. No way... But maybe the age of some books is over. People say to me sometimes 'Steve, are you ever going to write a straight novel, a serious novel' and by that they mean a novel about college professors who are having impotence problems or something like that. And I have to say those things just don't interest me. Why? I don't know. But it took me about twenty years to get over that question, and not be kind of ashamed about what I do, of the books I write.
My first published novel, American Rust, took three and a half years of full-time work to write. But I wrote two apprentice novels before that.
My first published novel, 'American Rust,' took three and a half years of full-time work to write. But I wrote two apprentice novels before that.
It took me about three years to write About Grace. I wasn't teaching two of those years, so I was working eight-hour days, five days a week. And it would include research and reading - it wasn't just a blank page, laying down words.
It only took me six months to get a record deal, but it took me 20 years to have a hit.
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