When I read, I'm purely a reader

I write because I want more than one life; I insist on a wider selection. It's greed, plain and simple.

I save the best of myself for novels, and I believe it shows

It seems to me that since I've had children, I've grown richer and deeper. They may have slowed down my writing for a while, but when I did write, I had more of a self to speak from.

...he thought of dying as a kind of adventure, something new that he hadn't yet experienced. Like an unusual vacation trip.

I don't type [when I write] because . . . I often have the feeling that everything flows directly from my right hand.

It’s like the grief has been covered over with some kind of blanket. It’s still there, but the sharpest edges are .. muffled, sort of. Then, ever now and then, I lift the corner of the blanket just to check, and .. whoa! Like a knife! I’m not sure that will ever change.