Stewart O'Nan
Stewart O'Nan
Stewart O'Nanis an American novelist...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth4 February 1961
CountryUnited States of America
promise legends facts
All stories teach us something, and promise us something, whether they're true or invented, legend or fact.
neat needs ragged
The story is always in service to the characters, and is only as long or short, or neat or ragged as it needs to be.
apollo early flight growing rockets travel
Growing up in the '60s and early '70s, with the space flight and the Apollo program, I always loved planes. I always loved rockets and I always loved space travel.
book good great time writes
No one writes a great book every time out, or even a good book.
favorite imagination offered peculiar points
As a fiction writer, my favorite tools are my imagination and the peculiar opportunities offered by different points of view.
hoping writer
I always squirm when I read what's called 'creative nonfiction,' and the writer is lobbing gobs of emotion and language at the world, hoping some of it will stick.
ask characters days endure faith hope main
My main question that I ask of my characters is, 'What does it feel like to be you? And how do you get through the day? Where do you find the hope and faith to endure getting through the days, and what are your days like?'
car crash local plot stock suburban
Local teenagers killed in a car crash is a suburban legend, a stock plot line.
next
If there is an audience out there for me, I want them to be surprised when the next book comes out.
since writers
I'm not sure the risks I take are any different from what other writers take, since we all serve at the pleasure of the reader.
I like the idea of being a working writer, not of saying that it's going to take me 30 years to write my magnum opus.
writing two stopping
The two hardest things about writing are starting and not stopping.
secret plot juicy
The spirit of Jane Eyre looms over Once Upon a Day. Lisa Tucker keeps the plot of this gothic novel bubbling with tons of juicy family secrets.
character writing trying
When I'm writing, I try to have the mask of my character on as I'm walking through the world. When I'm not at my desk, the rest of the time, I try to stay in that character and see the world the way that character would It's almost like method acting in a way — keeping the character close the way the actor keeps a script close and always tries to be in character.