Elin Hilderbrand

“...Every life contains a novel.”

“The nice thing about e-books is that if you're sitting on the beach and you finish one Elin Hilderbrand novel and don't want to get out of your chair, you can sit there, buy the rest, and load them on your device.”

“Like most writers, I read constantly. I used to hide in remote parts of the yard and house so I could read in peace.”

“I had a Kindle for a brief while, but I dropped it in the ocean, and that was the end of electronic reading for me.”

“I am a very nerdy reader in that I am as disciplined about my reading as I am about my writing.”

“The world needs voices that are positive and grateful, and that can be me.”

“What I write about in my novels is also what's in my life.”

“Venting your anger on anyone - especially complete strangers - is not a winning tactic. Be especially sweet to bartenders and people serving you food.”

“Americans are really in love with their summertime.”

“For women, my best travel tip is to invest in two to three cashmere ponchos. I buy the brand Minnie Rose. They're good cover in three seasons, and they make wonderful travel blankets.”

“I have this ridiculous exercise regime in the summer that I do not deviate from.”

“Meredith immersed herself in the novels. For some reason, fiction hit on the meaning of life so much more concisely than real life itself did.”

“What happened when we died? How were we to know that death wasn't as profound an adventure as life was?”

“For graduate school I ended up going to the University of Iowa, which is, of course, the best graduate writing program in the country.”

“I live a life very similar to my characters in that I live a full-blown summer fantasy from June to September. I go to the beach and work there every day.”

“Iowa City is okay as Midwestern cities go, but there's no food, no culture, no ocean.”

“I may not want to write every day, but I have no choice - there are deadlines to meet.”

“I have no skills! I can't speak French, I can't ski, I can't play the guitar... I can barely log on to the Internet! All I know how to do is write novels (thank goodness) and run, and anyone who has seen me run knows I'm not very good at that, either.”

“One is never too young for fine literature . . .”

“I have met women who said, 'I started reading you when I sat in the chemo chair, and it made me feel better.' That is as humbling as it gets, to know that you, in some way, made the worst day of their life a little bit better.”