Meg Rosoff
Meg Rosoff
Meg Rosoff is an American writer based in London, United Kingdom. She is best known for the novel How I Live Now, which won the Guardian Prize, Printz Award, and Branford Boase Award and made the Whitbread Awards shortlist. Her second novel, Just in Casewon the annual Carnegie Medal from the British librarians recognising the year's best children's book published in the U.K...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionWriter
CountryUnited States of America
becoming generally good huge learnt lovely numbers people reverse since work writer
One of the more interesting things I've learnt since becoming a writer is that if you like the book, you'll generally like the person. It doesn't always work in reverse - there are huge numbers of lovely people out there writing not very good books.
convincing incredibly naturally people slightly teenagers
People talk about writing convincing teenagers like it's a really clever thing to do, but it comes incredibly naturally to me. Which, of course, is slightly a worry.
bit bothered maybe people proper seemed teenager until
Like many other people of my generation, I don't think I ever really bothered to grow up. I wasn't ever really a proper teenager until I was about 19, and maybe I got a bit stuck there, because it seemed to go on and on.
african brought decided dissect supposed touching trace
I can actually trace the moment I decided I couldn't be a doctor. It was in biology, they brought in these African crickets and we were supposed to dissect them - but there's no way I was touching those bugs.
drop life
Life doesn't go on forever, and you don't want to drop dead without ever having done what you wanted to do.
books hard huge particular
It's hard recommending books for kids, and a huge responsibility. If you get it wrong, they don't tell you they hate that particular book, they tell you they hate reading.
I always think plot is what you fall back on if you can't write, to keep things going.
expect optimistic quite
I am quite a cheerful, dark person. On the outside, I'm optimistic but I expect the worst to happen.
coming fact family normal seem state
The thing about adolescence is that you are emerging from a state of obscurity. You are coming out into the world from your family. Your family can seem normal because it is your family and all you know, but in fact it is a mess.
catch grown home indeed kids suburban
When I was at university, there was such a strong delineation between city kids and those who had grown up the suburbs. City kids were so at home in the world, in a way that suburban kids take years to catch up, if indeed they ever can.
almost bother experience rarely reviews themselves
In my experience, adults rarely bother reading the reviews of children's books and almost never read the books themselves - particularly if they don't have children.
great
Writing's a great skill, but thinking's a better one.
cancer died life younger
My younger sister Debby had died of cancer, which started me writing - the sense of life being short. Cancer focuses your mind.
people
I think most people struggle over a matter of years to find a satisfying way to live.