Ruta Sepetys

Literary Birthday – 19 November – Ruta Sepetys

Happy Birthday, Ruta Sepetys, born 19 November 1967.

Ruta Sepetys Quotes

  1. I leapt eagerly into books. The characters’ lives were so much more interesting than the lonely heartbeat of my own.
  2. Sometimes there is such beauty in awkwardness. There’s love and emotion trying to express itself, but at the time, it just ends up being awkward.
  3. Shelves without books were lonely and just plain wrong.
  4. Decisions, they shape our destiny.
  5. Have you ever wondered what a human life is worth? That morning, my brother’s was worth a pocket watch.
  6. What was life asking of me? How could I respond when I didn’t know the question?
  7. Writers of historical fiction would be lost without libraries and archives.

Five Writing Tips

  1. Join a critique group. It will help your writing immensely. Having several people read your work and give you feedback can be very enlightening. It’s also fun to share your writing journey with other writers.
  2. I don’t have large blocks of time to sit and write. I snatch bits and pieces when I can, which often means in traffic, on planes, or very early in the morning. I always carry paper and pen with me. I often write dialogue longhand. I’ll see a scene (as if I’m watching a movie) and the characters will just start talking. I recently wrote several chapters of my latest book while sitting on the edge of the bathtub.
  3. I’m a big reviser. In fact, maybe I’m more of a reviser than a writer.
  4. Get your heart broken, thrown on the ground and stomped on a few times. Take a whirl at being an outcast, a total loser, or being publicly humiliated. Although painful at the time, it will provide great material for future books.
  5. Read. Good writers are great readers. Read hundreds of books. Seriously.

Ruta Sepetys is a Lithuanian-American writer. Her debut novel, Between Shades of Gray, was a New York Times Bestseller. Her second novel, Out of the Easy is set in the French Quarter of New Orleans in 1950, and her third novel Salt to the Sea exposes one of the greatest hidden disasters of World War II. Ruta lives in a treehouse in the hills of Tennessee.

Source for Image:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ruta_Sepetys_on_September_9,_2016_on_the_forecourt_of_Haus_der_Berliner_Festspiele_in_Berlin.jpg

Christoph Rieger, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

by Amanda Patterson

Please click here for our Literary Birthday Calendar

Posted on: 19th November 2014
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