Top 35 Don Roff Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Nothing says work efficiency like panic mode.”

— Don Roff

2. “A day of bad writing is always better than a day of no writing.”

— Don Roff

3. “Write about the thing that scares you most or your most private confession and you’ll never have a problem coming up with decent fiction.”

— Don Roff

4. “A migraine is the cockblock of writing.”

— Don Roff

5. “It’s my belief that people enter your life at exactly the right time.”

— Don Roff

6. “It’s better to write something, anything, than to starve the monster. The monster must feed. And it will feed on your soul if not your words. Its appetite is insatiable. Write to save yourself from the monster.”

— Don Roff

7. “But people in a small town tend to do a lot of talking, even when they don’t know what they’re talking about.”

— Don Roff

8. “Authors must spend months, years making fantasy believable in a single work while reality runs rampant and complete chaos elsewhere.”

— Don Roff

9. “Fear and self-doubt are the deadly enemies of creativity. Don’t invite either into your mind.”

— Don Roff

10. “Writing a first-draft battle scene is akin to real combat – chaos, confusion, and you must keep your cool as you fire word bullets downrange.”

— Don Roff

11. “Nothing’s a better cure for writer’s block than to eat ice cream right out of the carton.”

— Don Roff

12. “There is no right or wrong way to write a novel. Each journey is different for every individual work and for every writer. The first error is never to begin; the second is never to finish.”

— Don Roff

13. “Mothman flew away from town, like a giant bat, and then disappeared from sight behind a thicket of skeletal autumn trees.”

— Don Roff

14. “Audiences will admire your character’s strength but connect with them through their weakness.”

— Don Roff

15. “Writers often torture themselves trying to get the words right. Sometimes you must lower your expectations and just finish it.”

— Don Roff

16. “A writer always writes.”

— Don Roff

17. “The recipe for great art has always been misery and a good bowel movement.”

— Don Roff

18. “Always mystify, torture, mislead, and surprise the audience as much as possible.”

— Don Roff

19. “Sometimes the wind made her feel like she was not alone. The icy blasts there seemed to whisper and call her name; they had done so tonight. Not only whispered her name but told her to do it. A frigid voice from somewhere in those January howls had told her to kill them, kill them all.”

— Don Roff

20. “You can be a writer who doesnt read everyday. But youre not fooling anyone. It shows, rather embarrassingly, in your work.”

— Don Roff

21. “I write fiction. It may have mystery, it may have horror, it may have fantasy, it may have love, but like life, it’s all the same genre.”

— Don Roff

22. “If you treat your characters like people, they’ll reward you by being fully developed individuals.”

— Don Roff

23. “Regarding the creative: never assume you’re the master, only the student. Your audience will determine if you’re masterful.”

— Don Roff

24. “Keep being bold on the page, and in life, and people cannot ignore you forever.”

— Don Roff

25. “When you’re writing what you love, it’s the most fun you can have with your clothing still on, unless of course, you write naked.”

— Don Roff

26. “I’ve found that busting your ass on a daily basis to make your art good, clear, and meaningful creates the most luck.”

— Don Roff

27. “Writing a story, regardless of length, begins always with a single word.”

— Don Roff

28. “Any conversation including the mention of Roald Dahl, Ray Bradbury, or Emily Dickinson is one worth getting into or at least eavesdropping.”

— Don Roff

29. “If you focus on the humanity of your stories, your characters, then the horror will be stronger, scarier. Without the humanity, the horror becomes nothing more than a tawdry parlor trick. All flash and no magic, and worst of all, no heart.”

— Don Roff

30. “When you print out your manuscript and read it, marking up with a pen, it sometimes feels like a criminal returning to the scene of a crime.”

— Don Roff

31. “When writing, I uncage KAT: Keep Adding Tension. Even if I don’t know where the story’s going, petting the KAT keeps it purring.”

— Don Roff

32. “Creativity and intelligence, rather than violence, are the best problem solvers.”

— Don Roff

33. “Write for impact first, money second. If you do it the other way around, you’ll end up with less of either.”

— Don Roff

34. “Love it when a compelling new character kicks open your mental door, tracks mud across your brain, and props their feet up on your cerebrum.”

— Don Roff

35. “The best writers I’ve read possess oodles of self-doubt, yet claw their way up with each work and remain humble. Boastful ones, not so much.”

— Don Roff

36. “The central message of the Clare series, I think, is not to underestimate or marginalize those who you deem weaker or different than yourself as you have no idea what they’re capable of. You never know – those of whom you relentlessly persecute may just end up killing you.”

— Don Roff

37. “I write every day whether somebody pays me or not. I write every day whether or not self-doubt is kicking my ass. It’s what writers must do.”

— Don Roff

38. “Writing is dreaming with your eyes open – and your heart on fire.”

— Don Roff