The world is hollow. It's a lot to take in. Like cracking an egg and finding nothing inside. Or a full grown elephant. Geraldine McCaughrean More Quotes by Geraldine McCaughrean More Quotes From Geraldine McCaughrean Not everyone can be strong or clever. Not everyone can be beautiful. But we can ALL be brave! Geraldine McCaughrean strong clever beautiful It's true: Everyone needs a reason to stay alive -- someone who justifies your existence. Someone who loves you. Not beyond all reason. Just loves you. Even just shows an interest. Even someone who doesn't exist, or isn't yours. No, no! They don't even have to love you! They just have to be there to love! Target for your arrows. Magnetic Pole to drag on your compass needle and stop it spinning and tell you where you're heading and...Someone to soak up all the yearning. That's what I think. Geraldine McCaughrean arrows love-you thinking There are things roaming around inside my head as clever as Theseus in the Labyrinth. It's just that nobody ever gave them the necessary piece of string, so they'll never find their way out. Geraldine McCaughrean roaming-around labyrinth clever I hate clowns. You can't see what they're thinking. Geraldine McCaughrean i-hate hate thinking I like people. I like watching them. It's just that I'd prefer to do it from a mile away using very powerful binoculars. Geraldine McCaughrean solitude powerful people He is everything, everything, everything I ever admired and wanted and couldn't have. He is everything I needed and couldn't find in real life. Of course he is. That's why I invented him. Geraldine McCaughrean real needed wanted Unhappy people do the oddest, most terrible things, just trying to keep despair at bay. All you have to do is accept them...go around them...take evasive action. Geraldine McCaughrean despair unhappy people [Peter Pan] has never broken his terrible habit of eavesdropping. So, maybe that wasn't the rustle of pages you heard while this story lasted, but Peter Pan himself, listening in. In exchanged for a story of yours, he might show you his most prized possession: James Hooks' map of Neverland. In exchange for a smile, he may show you Neverland itself. Geraldine McCaughrean hook broken listening If you want to please me very much, you will fall down when I shoot you," -Oates The White Darkness Geraldine McCaughrean please-me white fall What people don't understand, they laugh at. Geraldine McCaughrean understanding laughing people I had a very happy childhood, but I still used my imagination as a leisure resort. Geraldine McCaughrean leisure childhood imagination happy I read hugely as a child, but I slowed up when the print got smaller. I am a very slow reader. I don't know why. Maybe it is like some people chewing their food for ages and some wolfing it down. Geraldine McCaughrean i-am child food people Never apologise for not being someone else. You're bound to find something you're good at, even if it's only writing stories. Geraldine McCaughrean someone never good you When people write fan-fic sequels to one of your books, it gives you a very strange feeling. It is very flattering but strange, as if the characters have come to life again without you knowing. Geraldine McCaughrean feeling you life people You sort of suspect if a book's fun to write, it will be fun to read. Geraldine McCaughrean will you fun book Writing is writing to me. I'm incapable of saying no to any writing job, so I've done everything - historical fiction, myths, fairy tales, anything that anybody expresses any interest in me writing, I'll write. It's the same reason I used to read as a child: I like going somewhere else and being someone else. Geraldine McCaughrean saying job child me My brother, whom I adored, typed out a children's book illustrated by himself... at the age of 14. My sister, with whom I always shared a double bed, had that effortless superiority of someone six years older and anxious to show it. But we were each as shy as voles. It seemed safer to keep to each other's company. Geraldine McCaughrean sister brother age children I always thought writer's block was something that prats used as an easy excuse for not doing any work. Geraldine McCaughrean doing thought easy work You need to be able to climb into a narrative and zip it up under your chin. You need to be able to see through the eyes of the hero, smell what he's smelling, hear what he's hearing. Geraldine McCaughrean climb eyes you hero I wept my way through teaching practice. Geraldine McCaughrean through teaching practice way