# Quote — Gregory Benford, In Alien Flesh

> A science fiction writer is—or should be—constrained by what is, or logically might be. That can mean simple fidelity to facts (which, in science, are always more important than theories—though Lord knows the two help shape each other, undermining the convenient, complacent separation of observer and observed). To me it also means heeding the authentic, the actual and concrete. Bad fiction uses the glossy generality; good writing needs the smattering of detail, the unrelenting busy mystery of the real.

- Author: [Gregory Benford](https://www.leafyquotes.com/gregory-benford.md)
- Book: [In Alien Flesh](https://www.leafyquotes.com/gregory-benford/in-alien-flesh.md)
- Page: 246
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Gregory_Benford#In_Alien_Flesh_(1986)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/gregory-benford/in-alien-flesh/a-science-fiction

## More from this book

> I would have to look, try to find a bridge that would make plausible what I knew but could scarcely prove. The standards of science are austere, unforgiving—and who would have it differently? I would have to hedge, to take one step back for each two forward, to compare and suggest and contrast, always sticking close to the data. And despite what I thought I knew now, the data would have to lead, they would have to show the way.

p. 244 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/gregory-benford/in-alien-flesh/i-would-have.md)

> But the answers come when they will, one piece at a time.

p. 232 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/gregory-benford/in-alien-flesh/but-the-answers.md)

> Talkers never acted when they could talk.

p. 53 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/gregory-benford/in-alien-flesh/talkers-never-acted.md)