Best 119 quotes of Sue Grafton on MyQuotes

After my years in Hollywood, I got tired of apologizing for work that really wasn't mine to begin with.

Age plays cruel tricks on the human face; all our repressed feelings become visible on the surface, where they harden like a mask.

A is for Alibi, my first book, was published in 1982. As it happened the next couple of books took place in June and August of that year. Without meaning to I painted myself into a corner. The other issue was the aging process. I did not want my main character to age one year for every book so I slowed the whole process down. This way I could get through all 26 letters of the alphabet without making her 109 years old in 2015. I might end the series in either 1990 or on New Years Eve 1989.

All of us are subjected to somebody else's power at some point. So once in a while you kiss ass. So what? Either you make your peace with that early, or you end up living your life as a crank and a misfit.

any mystery writer is both magician and moralist ... two species of artist in short supply.

A woman should never, never, never be financially dependent to anyone, especially a man, because the minute you were dependent, you could be abused.

Emotion doesn't travel in a straight line. Like water, our feelings trickle down through cracks and crevices, seeking out the little pockets of neediness and neglect, the hairline fractures in our character usually hidden from public view.

Everything happens for a reason, but that doesn't mean there's a point.

Except for cases that clearly involve a homicidal maniac, the police like to believe murders are committed by those we know and love, and most of the time they're right - a chilling thought when you sit down to dinner with a family of five. All those potential killers passing their plates.

For the record, I'd like to say that I'm a big fan of forgiveness as long as I have a chance to get even first" Kinsey Millhone, V is for Vengeance

Ghosts don't haunt us. That's not how it works. They're present among us because we won't let go of them." "I don't believe in ghosts," I said, faintly. "Some people can't see the color red. That doesn't mean it isn't there," she replied.

Ghosts don't haunt us. That's not how it works. They're present among us because we won't let go of them.

God save us from the people who want to do what's best for us.

Grade school was perilous. ... I can see how I must have worried them. I was the kind of kid who, for no apparent reason, wept piteously or threw up on myself. On an especially scary day, I sometimes did both.

Grief is as contagious as a yawn.

grief is an illness I can't recover from.

Grief rolled across the space between us like a wash of salt water.

Grieving is like being ill. You think the entire world revolves around you and it doesn't.

Having reached the halfway mark in the alphabet, my prime focus is on writing each new book as well as I can.

He might be a man without character, but she was a woman without courage. Of the two, which was worse?

I caution writers all the time to slow down and pay more attention to the work in front of them than to the end result. I don't think you write one book and get anywhere. I think you write five books and then maybe you are finally on the right path.

Ideas are easy. It's the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats.

If high heels were so wonderful, men would still be wearing them.

If I'd been listening closely, I'd have caught the sound of the gods having a great big old tee-hee at my expense.

I figure guys are like Whitman's Samplers. I like to take a little bite out of each and then move on before the whole box gets stale.

I focus on the writing and let the rest of the process take care of itself. I've learned to trust my own instincts and I've also learned to take risks.

If your mind isn't open, keep your mouth shut too.

I hate nature. I really do. Nature is composed entirely of sticks, dirt, fall-down places, biting and stinging things, and savageries too numerous to list. And I'm not the only one who feels this way. Man has been building cities since the year oughty-ought, just to get away from this stuff.

I love being single. It's almost like being rich.

I made the rules I figured I could be the one to break them. I thought I would write about xenophobia, a hatred of foreigners. After I stated writing the story there was not a foreigner to be had. I did not want to just stick one in there so I could get a title out of it since it seemed like cheating. I never figured out how I could get out of this dilemma so I just called it X and weaved X traits into the story.

In my opinion, there's no condition in life that can't be ameliorated by a dose of junk food.

Insecure people have a special sensitivity for anything that finally confirms their own low opinion of themselves.

I read the paper every day. There are certain subjects that will catch my attention. I have an entire file of articles. Of course I make up the story, especially since most criminals are not very smart and fictional crime must be clever. I have to make sure the story I am telling is interesting and realistic. In this book I went on line and found out the manners of codes. I thought it interesting to use them as a jumping off point.

I spent the first twenty years of my writing career preparing for the mystery genre, which is my favorite literary form.

I think you'd best make your peace with the past since you've come this far. I think you know by now that you won't go back again.

It is a truth of human nature that we can ponder life's mysteries for only so long before we lose interest and move on to something else.

It's been my observation, after years in the [insurance] business, that a certain percent of the population simply can't resist the urge to cheat.

It's disconcerting to realize how little you have to say to someone who once occupied such a prominent place in your bed.

I've never known anyone yet who doesn't suffer a certain restlessness when autumn rolls around... We're all eight years old again and anything is possible.

I've never written about my husband, Steve, or any of my children because I know them all too well. I see them in all their complexities which makes them impossible to render on the printed page.

I was an English major in college with minors in Fine Arts and Humanities.

I write because it's all I know how to do. Writing is my anchor and my purpose. My life is informed by writing, whether the work is going well or I'm stuck in the hell of writer's block, which I'm happy to report only occurs about once a day.

I write letters to my right brain all the time. They're just little notes. And right brain, who likes to get little notes from me, will often come through within a day or two.

Kinsey was never a lawyer. She's strictly blue collar.

Life was reduced to its four basic elements: air, food, drink, and a good friend.

Lucky is the spouse who dies first, who never has to know what survivors endure.

Lying contains the same hostile elements as a practical joke in that the 'victim' ends up looking foolish in his own eyes and laughable in everyone else's.

My father taught me to love detective fiction writers such as Raymond Chandler. When I decided to have a hard-boiled detective series I did a lot of studying before I wrote the first book. I learned police procedure, the California criminal law, and many areas outside my expertise.

My job as the writer is to fool you. Your job as the reader is to see if you can catch me at it.

My primary lesson, however, was that I'm a solo writer, happiest when I'm making all the executive decisions. I've always been willing to rise or fall on my own merits.