Success is so fleeting, even if you get a good book deal or your book is a huge success, there's always the fear: What about the next one?

I don't want to lean back into the past, or forward into the future. I don't want to wish the present moment away.

When I was starting out there was no Internet, there wasn't this sense that you could be connected to other writers around the world. And that created a kind of innocence, or parochial quality, even in NYC.

As a writer we are our own instruments; we need to protect our instrument, because no one will protect it if we don't.

Our pain is a part of who we authentically are.

I think there's something about a writer's disposition, that is, even if unaware, always slightly in a witness state.

I found myself doing so much public speaking, more and more and bigger and bigger.