Elizabeth Crook Quotes
When Larry Wright won the Pulitzer for The Looming Tower we all strutted around for weeks, until some sourpuss among us noted that it was actually Larry, and not the rest of us, who won the prize.
Elizabeth Crook
Quotes to Explore
It took me ten years to write The Night Journal, so that was a big ordeal.
Elizabeth Crook
I grew up thirty miles down the highway in San Marcos, and I've still got family there, so I guess I'm pretty well rooted.
Elizabeth Crook
In middle school I wrote a paper on Hemingway and none of the sentences had more than five words.
Elizabeth Crook
I knew from previous books not to count on anything in terms of sales. My first novel - -The Raven's Bride, about Sam Houston's disastrous first marriage - -sold well and got attention, but my second book - -Promised Lands, about the Texas Revolution - -didn't.
Elizabeth Crook
As for whether genre considerations influence what I write, they don't at all, but I might sell more books if they did. The Night Journal is a hodge-podge of historical fiction, western, mystery, and contemporary domestic drama. It doesn't settle into a specific market, reviewers have a hard time describing it, and sometimes it gets classified weirdly in bookstores. But from a writer's standpoint, I like that it's hard to categorize.
Elizabeth Crook
I love the writers in Austin. We stick together. We all like each other and go to each other's book signings in case no one else shows up.
Elizabeth Crook
I love the mystery, the reconstruction of history, and the way past and future define each other.
Elizabeth Crook
It seems like the Western genre has crept out of its casings during the last few years, and expanded to include books and movies we wouldn't originally have thought of as westerns.
Elizabeth Crook
Promised Lands was a better book in my opinion, and it's still my mother's favorite of the three I've done, but I doubt anyone who isn't a blood relative has ever heard of it. Which is to say expectations aren't worth much in the book world.
Elizabeth Crook
The author with the greatest influence on me is my friend Stephen Harrigan, who critiques everything I write before I even bother to show it to my agent or editor. He's a truly great writer - author of Gates of the Alamo and other books you might know of, and his instincts about what's working in a story, and what's not, are just about perfect. My books would be very different without his influence.
Elizabeth Crook
I'm halfway through a novel set in two time frames - Austin in the 1960's and Alpine Texas in present day. It started out to be a small, lighthearted, humorous book about family relationships; I was tired of writing war stories and tragedies.
Elizabeth Crook
Angle of Repose is one of my favorite books. I fell in love with it in college. When I submitted The Night Journal to my agent she got very excited because she said it reminded her of Angle of Repose.
Elizabeth Crook
As for anticipation, you never know what to expect of a book. They're like kids: you bring them into the world, fret about them, and then at some point there's no other option but to turn them lose and see how they do.
Elizabeth Crook
I wrote a paper in school on William Faulkner and no one could tell what the sentences meant.
Elizabeth Crook
I love Austin. It's great here. I don't mind the heat.
Elizabeth Crook
The Night Journal received two awards that I'm terribly proud of - -the Spur from Western Writers of America, and the Willa Literary Award from Women Writing the West. Both these groups are filled with great writers and good people.
Elizabeth Crook
My brother was older, and since the law of the west was fairly entrenched in our household, whoever was bigger got control of the television. I sat mesmerized, and horrified, through hundreds of gunfights and became emotionally involved with everyone in Bonanza and Gunsmoke.
Elizabeth Crook
When Larry Wright won the Pulitzer for The Looming Tower we all strutted around for weeks, until some sourpuss among us noted that it was actually Larry, and not the rest of us, who won the prize.
Elizabeth Crook
