But there's one thing I'm sure about. An opening line should invite the reader to begin the story. It should say: Listen. Come in here. You want to know about this.

...for the first time in my life, writing was hard. The problem was the teaching...by most Friday afternoons I felt as if I'd spent the week with jumper cables clamped to my brain.

Say your name over two hundred times and discover you are no one.

I’m convinced that fear is at the root of most bad writing. Dumbo got airborne with the help of a magic feather; you may feel the urge to grasp a passive verb or one of those nasty adverbs for the same reason. Just remember before you do that Dumbo didn’t need the feather; the magic was in him.

Paul Edgecomb: What do you want me to do John? I'll do it. You want me to let you walk out of here and see how far you get? John Coffey: Now why would you want to do a foolish thing like that? Paul Edgecomb: When I die and I stand before God awaiting judgment and he asks me why I let one of HIS miracles die, what am I gonna say, that it was my job?

Dolls with no little girls around to mind them were sort of creepy under any conditions.

The monster nevers dies.