“When you believe you've become the best writer you can be you still arent.”

“Without imagination, writing is a stack of lumber, a sack of nails, and a locked tool shed.”

“Writing a novel is easy writing checks is hard.”

“I like to think that when I complete a novel I learned something along the way.”

“Writing is a craft, being an author is work, and having readers and a following is a gift.”

“When you believe you've become the best writer you can be… you still aren’t.”

“But some characters in books are really real--Jane Austen's are; and I know those five Bennets at the opening of Pride and Prejudice, simply waiting to raven the young men at Netherfield Park, are ...”

“You take people, you put them on a journey, you give them peril, you find out who they really are.”

“A novel must show how the world truly is, how characters genuinely think, how events actually occur. A novel should somehow reveal the true source of our actions.”

“I wore only black socks, because I had heard that white ones were the classic sign of the American tourist. Black ones though,- those'll fool 'em. I supposed I hoped the European locals' conversati...”

“The Lord of Rags and Tatters.”

“He wanted to heat up the truth, to make it burn so hot that you would feel exactly what he felt.”

“Make up a story... For our sake and yours forget your name in the street; tell us what the world has been to you in the dark places and in the light. Don't tell us what to believe, what to fear. Sh...”

“Tell the story as if it were only of interest to the small circle of your characters, of which you may be one. There is no other way to put life into the story.”