“I was working my first adult job, a quasi journalistic job, writing co...” — Garth Risk Hallberg Quote

I was working my first adult job, a quasi journalistic job, writing content for a website. In the offices, we had banks of TVs, papers, a constant media stream, which was unusual for 2001.

We who curate our Twitter feeds and Facebook walls understand that at least part of what we're doing publicly, 'like'-ing what we like, is trying to separate ourselves from the herd.

In graduate school, I was a student of E.L. Doctorow, and he had us read 'Moby-Dick' in a week.

It may be that Tolstoy and Virginia Woolf were sitting around fretting about their Amazon reviews or their pre-pub whatever, but I kind of doubt it. I don't think that's how the work probably got made.

Writing for adults and writing for young people is really not that different. As a reporter, I have always tried to write as clearly and simply as possible. I like clean, unadorned writing. So writing for a younger audience was largely an exercise in making my prose even more clear and direct, and in avoiding complicated digressions.

Sometimes I think that the one thing I love most about being an adult is the right to buy candy whenever and wherever I want.

After starting as a journalist for newspapers and magazines, I began to write books and had success with a novel and four nonfiction books for young adults.

You can rebel against everything adults say. When I want to find out what the new music is, I find out what parents hate.