You can’t control what other people think about your art. Think about the part of yourself that you can control, which is your ability to be kind and loving and creative.

It was all in my head and now all I had to do was figure out a way to get it down on paper.

I always feel it is a shortcoming of mine as a reader and as a writer that I frankly need to like somebody.

I don't believe in fate, as in, which I - as a Catholic, I think, sort of predestination. But I certainly believe in chance.

Art stands on the shoulders of craft, which means that to get to the art, you must master the craft.

One must not be shy where language is concerned.

I believe that, more than anything else, this grief of constantly having to face down our own inadequacies is what keeps people from being writers. Forgiveness, therefore, is key. I can't write the book I want to write, but I can and will write the book I am capable of writing. Again and again throughout the course of my life I will forgive myself.