Greg Rucka

“When there's a clear vision, and you've got the creative teams working toward that goal, each on their own, it can then come together quite elegantly at the endpoint.”

“Comics fans want new stuff that looks exactly like the old stuff. It is hard for the publishers, and even the audience, to change something.”

“Every writer is going to end up drawing from their own experiences in one way or another.”

“We forget when we're all grown up. 16 was a long time ago. It's hard to remember how freakin' difficult it is as 16! Life is not easy, and you're trying to figure stuff out.”

“Good fiction can both entertain and light up those dark corners where nice people don't want to go.”

“There was a time in my career when my hackles would really get raised if someone came in and said, 'We need you to do this or that.' But the fact of the matter is, you're working in a shared universe, and all elements of the universe are, ideally, going to mesh and work together. That's my goal. I want to be on the team.”

“It's funny because you know the novel process: you get the drafts, you get the galley, and then you get the galley proofs. You have opportunities to change things all along. But the further along in the process you go, the more careful you have to be in making those changes, and the smaller the changes have to be.”

“If someone arrives, fully functional yet a tabula rasa, how does their environment influence, educate, even mold them? And if that is a nurture question, then where does that character's nature fit in? How does that manifest?”

“There is a sequence in my 'Detective Comics' run where you can't find consecutive issues by the same artist. That's intentional. That was done on purpose.”

“I am the product of Denny O'Neil in many ways, I carry forth a lot of what Denny instilled in me.”

“'Alpha' is a very fast-moving book. It doesn't lend itself to laborious introspection and the navel-gazing that some stories can fall prey to.”

“If Portland can truly have a true comics show that doesn't become a media show but retains its focus on comics, I think it's going to serve the city well. If this becomes a big show, it's going to bring in a lot of money for the city.”

“Hope can live in a vacuum.”

“When I was in high school, I started writing a serial novel, longhand, set in the Arthurian mythos, and influenced not incidentally by Marion Zimmer Bradley's 'The Mists of Avalon.'”

“I met one of my best resources because I cold-called the local FBI office one day early in my career with questions. The agent who took the call knew someone who knew someone who was ex-Army, trained in personal protection. The resulting introduction was one of the best, most enduring friendships I've ever enjoyed.”

“I just know that if you make a Superman movie you can't take kids to, you've done something wrong.”

“Emotional honesty transcends reality; it's what allows disbelief to be suspended and yet what makes a story stay true.”

“I come from a prose background. I come from short story background, and that led me into novels.”

“I think if you look back at some of the stuff that we broadly label as the crime 'ouvre,' there are certainly elements of the supernatural at work.”

“I'm not a huge Lovecraft fan as far as that goes; I think there are some stories of his that are really quite wonderful, but for the most part, I have great difficulties with his prose - and the more you know about the man, the harder it is to separate him from the work in many ways.”