It would be wonderful to have a guru; it would be like having a social worker or a personal trainer, not that people who had either of these necessarily appreciated the advice they received.

Do not take on a traditionally built person unless you are prepared for a heavyweight bout.

I just focus on getting the first scene right, with a few lines about the overall plot, and then the book grows organically.

The Culture of Complaint... We live in a culture of complaint because everyone is always looking for things to complain about. It's all tied in with the desire to blame others for misfortunes and to get some form of compensation into the bargain.

It was the same with friendship. Disagreement between friends and spouses, too had to be carefully handled. If the time you spent with friends was consumed by disagreement, then there was no room for the essence of friendship, which was a sharing of the world. And that sharing involved seeing things the same way, or at least seeing things through the eyes of the friend.

I'm very interested in tea. I wouldn't mind being involved in some aspect of the tea industry.

Reality television, which turned its eye on people who were doing nothing but being themselves, was the perfect expression of this trend [of narcissism]. Let's look at ourselves, it said. Aren't we fascinating?