Whenever I saw her, I felt like I had been living in another country, doing moderately well in another language, and then she showed up speaking English and suddenly I could speak with all the complexity and nuance that I hadn't realized was gone. With Lucy I was a native speaker.

That's important to me, to recommend books.

Learn to write by writing

If I was a waitress, I was too tired at the end of the day when I came home to try to write.

If anybody had shown me the paperwork for how my life was going to look in five years, I would have said, "No. That is not where I want to go."

The thing you can count on in life is that Tennessee will always be scorching hot in August.

People seem able to love their dogs with an unabashed acceptance that they rarely demonstrate with family or friends. The dogs do not disappointment them, or, if they do, the owners manages to forget about it quickly. I want to learn to love people like this, the way I love my dog, with pride and enthusiasm and a complete amnesia for faults. In short, to love others the way my dog loves me.