They say the smart dog obeys but the smarter dog knows when to disobey.

In my head there's a broken balcony I fall off of when I speak.

I started writing by doing small related things but not the thing itself, circling it and getting closer. I had no idea how to write fiction. So I did journalism because there were rules I could learn. You can teach someone to write a news story. They might not write a great one, but you can teach that pretty easily.

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

I meet a person, and in my mind I'm saying three minutes; I give you three minutes to show me the spark.

It is possible to imagine a person so entirely that the image resists attempts to dislodge it.

nothing is ever quite as bad as it could be.