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.

It's odd how violence and humor so often go together, isn't it?

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

Evolution brings human beings. Human beings, through a long and painful process, bring humanity.

The beauty of that June day was almost staggering. After the wet spring, everything that could turn green had outdone itself in greenness and everything that could even dream of blooming or blossoming was in bloom and blossom. The sunlight was a benediction. The breezes were so caressingly soft and intimate on the skin as to be embarrassing.

I loved almost everything about being a teacher, but I was an unusual teacher

A token of ecological awareness in a society devoted to self destruction and waste but unwilling to acknowledge its indulgent ways.