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.

All violence flows from the same source ... the need for power. Power is the only true morality ... the only deathless god, and the appetite for violence is its only commandment.

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

This is every writer's nightmare - the sudden breakdown of meaning in the language that sustains and supports us.

His imagination was always more real than the reality of daily life.

Words are the only bullets in truth's bandolier. And poets are the snipers.

I despair at the rise of modern violence. I truly give in to despair at times, that deep, futureless pit of despair.... I watch the American slaughterhouse, the casual attacks on popes, presidents, and uncounted others, and I wonder if there are many more out there with the Ability or if butchery has simply become the modern way of life.