If you are looking for smart judging based on merit, skip the Academy Awards next year and pay attention to the Independent Spirit Awards.

It is my feeling that a story is not finished until it is read, and that the reader finishes it through his or her life experience, prejudices, worldview and thoughts.

Develop craftsmanship through years of wide reading.

Writing comes from reading, and reading is the finest teacher of how to write.

What I find to be very bad advice is the snappy little sentence, 'Write what you know.' It is the most tiresome and stupid advice that could possibly be given. If we write simply about what we know we never grow. We don't develop any facility for languages, or an interest in others, or a desire to travel and explore and face experience head-on. We just coil tighter and tighter into our boring little selves. What one should write about is what interests one.

Wonderful ... I was up all night reading it, laughing and crying out in horror.

It's easier to die if others around you are dying.