Mickey Spillane (b. March 9th): “Nobody reads a mystery to get to the middle.”

9 Mar

Mickey Spillane, born 9 March 1918, and died 17 July 2006, was an American author of crime novels, many featuring Mike Hammer. More than 225 million copies of his books have sold internationally.

Quotes on writing:

  1. Hemingway hated me. I sold 200 million books, and he didn’t. Of course most of mine sold for 25 cents, but still… you look at all this stuff with a grain of salt.
  2. If you’re a singer you eventually lose your voice. A baseball player loses his arm. But a writer gets more knowledge, and if he’s good, the older he gets, the better he writes.
  3. Nobody reads a mystery to get to the middle. They read it to get to the end. If it’s a letdown, they won’t buy any more. The first page sells that book. The last page sells your next book.

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