“I have to have a character worth caring about. I tend not to start wri...” — Richard Russo Quote

“I have to have a character worth caring about. I tend not to start writing books about people I don't have a lot of sympathy for because I'm just going to be with them too long.”

“Some authors have a very hard time understanding that in order to be faithful to the spirit of the book, it's almost always impossible to remain faithful to the text. You have to make changes.”

“I read pretty voraciously. If it's good, I don't care what it is.”

“The easiest way for readers to connect with characters and feel sympathy is to make the character entertaining, sympathetic and likeable.”

“Children, even infants, are capable of sympathy. But only after adolescence are we capable of compassion.”

“I think we lost a great deal of sympathy and support with the way in which the crisis was handled, most importantly I think when we appeared to be grasping for too much at one time instead of identifying our priorities in a much more responsible fashion.”