I think we often write because we feel a loneliness, and people read for the same reason, and then they come away feeling a little less lonely.

After all, Bao Bomu says, what is the past but what we choose to remember?

My parents had very high expectations. They expected me to get straight A's from the time I was in kindergarten.

All objects exist in a moment of time.

Among writers, if you don't have a therapist, it's like saying you don't keep a journal or use the thesaurus. It's a natural accompaniment.

You write a book and you hope somebody will go out and pay $24.95 for what you've just said. I think books were my salvation. Books saved me from being miserable.

It was a distorted form of inverse logic: If hopes never come true, then hope for what you don't want.