Kate DiCamillo

“I always have a notebook with me, I eavesdrop; I write down what people say. It's very rare that one of those things will provoke a story, but I think that that kind of paying attention all the time, and keeping everything open, lets the stories come in. But where they come from is still a mystery to me.”

“I write in my house, at my desk, where I have Christmas lights strung over it to try and convince me that I'm having a good time. I can't really write anywhere else.”

“Listen, said Beverly. Let me tell you something. There is no Very Friendly Animal Center. That cat is long gone.”

“Magic is always impossible. It begins with the impossible and ends with the impossible and is impossible in between. That's why it is magic.”

“How do I feel when I look back at prior work? Hmmm. I think, 'I tried to do the best I could do. It's not perfect. It will never be perfect.' And then I think, 'I want to try again.'”

“I was a very sickly kid and suffered from chronic pneumonia, which is why we moved to the warm southern climate. I think being ill contributed to my development as a writer. I learned early on to entertain myself by reading.”

“I'm never impressed with myself!”

“Understand, I had absolutely no interest in writing; I wanted to be a Writer.”

“When I was starting to write, I was fascinated with 'Knuffle Bunny' by Mo Willems. I remember taking it home and typing it out, trying to figure out how it worked. It's just a classic, with dauntingly few words.”

“There," she said. She rocked him back and forth. "There, you foolish, beautiful boy who wants to change the world. There, there. And who could keep from loving you? Who could keep from loving a boy so brave and true?”

“It distresses me that parents insist that their children read or make them read. The best way for children to treasure reading is to see the adults in their lives reading for their own pleasure.”

“She said the words, and then she had a strange moment of seeing them, hanging there over her head. "You're going to vacuum up that squi”

“There was something scary about watching adults sleep. It was as if no one at all were in charge of the world.”

“Writing my own stories had always been one of my dreams, but I didn't start until I was 29. I was working in a book warehouse and was assigned to the third floor where all the children's books were. For four and a half years, I spent all day, every day around children's books, and it wasn't long before I fell in love with them.”

“I always write with music. It takes me a while to figure out the right piece of music for what I'm working on. Once I figure it out, that's the only thing I'll play.”

“He felt a wonderful certainty. The impossible, he thought, the impossible is about to happen again.”

“I didn't really start to write until I was almost 30, and I started with the short stories.”

“I hate to cook and love to eat.”

“Reader, do you think it is a terrible thing to hope when there is really no reason to hope at all? Or is it (as the soldier said about happiness) something that you might just as well do, since,in the end, it really makes no difference to anyone but you?”

“And hope is like love...a ridiculous, wonderful, powerful thing.”