Sara Zarr Quotes

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Sara Zarr

Profession : Writer

Birth : October 3, 1970

I'm so focused on trying to craft the story that I'm in my own little world with it and that process. The one reader I'm trying to please as I write is me, and I'm pretty difficult to please.

Sara Zarr

The characters are whole, real people to me that I'm getting to know, and since real people are all flawed, so are my characters, I hope.

Sara Zarr

When a young reader tells you that they'd never finished a book outside of school until they read yours, or that they really needed to hear something that one of your characters says or thinks... that's just rewarding and humbling.

Sara Zarr

My parents met in music school, and my father was a music professor and conductor. Growing up, we always had classical and contemporary music playing.

Sara Zarr

I played the clarinet, and my sister played the violin... If we'd had the discipline and the passion, maybe we could have been good.

Sara Zarr

My first published book, 'Story of a Girl', was the fourth book I wrote.

Sara Zarr

I don't want to pretend like I'm some intellectual person who understands Flannery O'Connor.

Sara Zarr

When my characters are questioning things, it's not me leading up to an answer; it's me asking those same questions and letting the characters' lives unfold and seeing where it takes them.

Sara Zarr

I grew up in San Francisco in the 1970s. We were part of a church that belonged to the California Jesus movement.

Sara Zarr

I always felt that church is where I'm going to find my community and people to live my life with.

Sara Zarr

Making lists of favorite things is, for me, a task ridden with anxiety. What if I've accidentally excluded something I love? What if I discover something new tomorrow that I love even more?

Sara Zarr

I tend to describe recurring themes as being part of a writer's DNA - something so deeply embedded in us that even we don't notice it until we've written three or four books.

Sara Zarr

Is it good, bad, or neutral to recognize thematic patterns in your own work? When it comes to recurring themes, I'm of the mind that knowledge is probably not power, at least in terms of the work.

Sara Zarr

Readers want a story, not a pattern. It's the specifics of a story that make it really ping our various reader radars.

Sara Zarr

My first job is to write the characters as full and authentic people as well as I can.

Sara Zarr