Writing
When Almond began writing the novel, he felt that Erin should be the main character because she was the strongest and because he wanted to write from the point of view of a girl this time. Almond referred to the novel's opening line of,"My name is Erin Law" as a "bit of an homage" to the opening line of Moby Dick, "Call me Ishmael." The abandoned building in the novel was inspired by a real building located on a "sludgy river gully" near the Tyne, which has been turned into Seven Stories, an attraction that promotes literature.
Read more about this topic: Heaven Eyes
Famous quotes containing the word writing:
“That of all the several ways of beginning a book which are now in practice throughout the known world, I am confident my own way of doing it is the best—I’m sure it is the most religious—for I begin with writing the first sentence—and trusting to Almighty God for the second.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“I can hardly bring myself to caution you against drinking, because I am persuaded that I am writing to a rational creature, a gentleman, and not to a swine. However, that you may not be insensibly drawn into that beastly custom of even sober drinking and sipping, as the sots call it, I advise you to be of no club whatsoever.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“The importance to the writer of first writing must be out of all proportion of the actual value of what is written.”
—Elizabeth Bowen (1899–1973)