Eighty percent of all novels are bought by women, or so I've heard. Bonnie Jo Campbell More Quotes by Bonnie Jo Campbell More Quotes From Bonnie Jo Campbell When I was little, we lived on 8 acres and my mom had a horse. But when I was 7, my mom kicked my dad out, and then in order to feed us five kids, she got critters cheap or for free and raised them for food. We milked a cow, raised chickens, pigs and beef cattle. We heated our one-story house with wood and stayed cold all winter. Bonnie Jo Campbell horse dad mom I do different work, teaching and running around visiting universities and bookstores, and that prevents me from writing. But it's nice to be wanted as a writer. Bonnie Jo Campbell nice teaching running My donkeys are Jack and Don Quixote. They're very smart, very cautious. Much of what people consider stubbornness in donkeys is actually cautiousness. Bonnie Jo Campbell cautiousness smart people Where I live you're not supposed to shoot a firearm within a quarter mile of a dwelling. Bonnie Jo Campbell quarters miles dwelling I have a second-degree black belt in Okinawan kobudo weapons training. Bonnie Jo Campbell training degrees black After a year, it was great to get out of L.A. and return to Hyde Park. Since my grandparents lived in Hyde Park, I had been coming there since I was a tyke. Bonnie Jo Campbell hyde grandparent years If you have someone falling out of the boat, you'd have to drag the boat up the river and film the same scene ten times, every time, dragging the boat exactly where it was up the river. Bonnie Jo Campbell film rivers fall There were a lot of beautiful, thin people out there driving nice cars. It was a whole different experience being in L.A. Bonnie Jo Campbell different-experiences nice beautiful The truth is I tried to write for years and I wasn't very good. Bonnie Jo Campbell truth-is writing years I loved writing for the school newspaper. I liked to report and interview people, but I really liked to write columns, funny columns. Bonnie Jo Campbell writing people school Being five-foot-ten at fourteen years old was a little bit scary. Bonnie Jo Campbell scary feet years I thought that you had to learn to write by yourself and if you couldn't do it, then you were out of luck. Bonnie Jo Campbell luck ifs writing I realized that I was writing about folks with lots of skills, especially fix-it skills and survival skills, who were nonetheless not doing well in the new-millennium America. Bonnie Jo Campbell skills writing america Drugs and drinking affect every family I know, country and city, middle-class and poor. Bonnie Jo Campbell drinking class country I can't personally drink or fight too much nowadays because I have to be perky in the morning in order to write. Bonnie Jo Campbell fighting writing morning I'm not much interested in my own self when I write. I'm interested in what I observe out there, what's going on around me. Bonnie Jo Campbell my-own self writing The best and easiest lesson for me was to learn that writing is mostly hard work. Bonnie Jo Campbell lessons hard-work writing Maybe the hardest lesson is the one I have to learn over and over again, that each story is its own animal, that every story I write is going to come only with difficulty. Bonnie Jo Campbell stories writing animal You can't beat a good sonnet, and you can write a sonnet without being married to the damned thing. Bonnie Jo Campbell married beats writing I like living near my family, and near the people I understand the best. The landscape of Michigan speaks to me, and the humility and humor of the people here makes sense. It just feels right to live here, in a place where I don't dare put on airs. Bonnie Jo Campbell speak humility people