After a while, the characters I'm writing begin to feel real to me. That's when I know I'm heading in the right direction.
Alice Hoffman

All the characters in my books are imagined, but all have a bit of who I am in them - much like the characters in your dreams are all formed by who you are.
Alice Hoffman

Among men and women, those in love do not always announce themselves with declarations and vows. But they are the ones who weep when you're gone. Who miss you every single night, especially when the sky is so deep and beautiful, and the ground so very cold.
Alice Hoffman

Any institution becomes a community - whether it's a high school or a boarding school or a publishing company or a small town where everybody knows certain things about people.
Alice Hoffman

Anyway, the sort of love that will not wait is probably best to pass by.
Alice Hoffman

Even in times when it's difficult to figure out, how do you go forward, art - and books - always help.
Alice Hoffman

Every time I finish a book, I forget everything I learned writing it - the information just disappears out of my head.
Alice Hoffman

Hawthorne has given us a tradition that some people refer to as Yankee Magic Realism, and I do think there is a certain quality to the landscape that definitely leads into the dark woods.
Alice Hoffman

I also like the whole idea of fairy tales and folk tales being a woman's domain, considered a lesser domain at the time they were told.
Alice Hoffman

I always felt and still feel that fairy tales have an emotional truth that is so deep that there are few things that really rival them.
Alice Hoffman

I always quit at three when my kids come home from school so I feel pretty spoiled.
Alice Hoffman

I can't really work on more than one thing at a time.
Alice Hoffman

I did go there later, but I hadn't been there before I wrote the book. Sometimes I feel like the imagined can feel more real than the real?
Alice Hoffman

I don't really read as much as I used to. A lot of what I was looking for as an escape I find in writing. And the other thing is that I don't want to get into someone else's language when I'm working.
Alice Hoffman

I don't think I make much of a distinction between the 'real' and the 'fantastic.' They both seem to be threads in the same cloth as far as I'm concerned.
Alice Hoffman

I feel more influenced in my own work by dreams than I do by other writers' works in a way. Or by popular culture, movies - what else is there to write about than love and loss?
Alice Hoffman

I never plot out my novels in terms of the tone of the book. Hopefully, once a story is begun it reveals itself.
Alice Hoffman

I never see a novel as a film while I'm writing it. Mostly because novels and films are so different, and I'm such an internal novelist.
Alice Hoffman

I really feel like the gift is also the curse. It's always half-and-half. Whatever brings you the most joy will also probably bring you the most pain. Always a price to pay.
Alice Hoffman

I think growing up is difficult and it's a process that I'm always interested in, with kids and adults, they are often on two different universes.
Alice Hoffman