I probably have less revision than those who have that wonderful rush of story to tell - you know, I can't wait to tell you what happened the other day. It comes tumbling out and maybe then they go back and refine. I kind of envy that way of working, but I just have never done it.

I exaggerated even before I began to exaggerate, because it's true — nothing is ever quite as bad as it could be.

What I think," Chatty says, "is that if a man loves a woman more than a woman loves a man, then they're even.

He wondered how we know that what happens to us isn't good.

I assemble stories-me and a hundred million other people-at the sentence level. Not by coming up with a sweeping story line.

We can only die in the future, I thought; right now we are always alive.

Wear your heart on the page, and people will read to find out how you solved being alive.