So often with beginning writers, the story that they want to start with is the most important story of their life - my molestation, my this, my horrible drug addiction - they want to tell that most important story, and they don't have the skills to tell it yet, so it ends up becoming a comedy. A powerful story told poorly becomes funny, it just makes people laugh behind their hands.

Only in death will we have our own names since only in death are we no longer part of the effort. In death we become heroes.

There are worse things you can do to the people you love than kill them. The regular way is just to watch the world do it. Just read the newspaper.

Are these things really better than the things I already have? Or am I just trained to be dissatisfied with what I have now?

You can tell a more over-the-top incredible story if you use a nonfiction form.

The truth is . . . you think what people want you to think.

You love me. You ignore me. You save my life, then you cook my mother into soap.