The best advice that an accomplished writer could give a beginning writer is probably, "Find your slide and then grease it." Almost every writer that wants a rewarding career, in terms of money and status and number of readers, finally finds a certain genre or certain style that he or she sticks with until reaching a critical mass of readership. And I've violated this from the get-go.

The past is dead and buried. But I know now that buried things have a way of rising to the surface when one least expects them to.

It occurs to me that our survival may depend upon our talking to one another.

Power: a currency that never went out of style.

But I think, and hope, that the novels can be understood and enjoyed as science fiction, on their own terms.

The young remember most deeply.... When we are old and failing, it is the memories of childhood which can be summoned most clearly.

If everyone could understand the working of a psychopath's mind, we undoubtedly would be closer to insanity ourselves.