I used to think when I had children that somebody else had the rule book and they hadn't given it to me, and everybody else knew how to do it right except me. I find the same thing in writing: you think that everybody knows what they're doing and that you don't.

I work too hard and don't play enough.

Writing is a solitary endeavor, but not a lonely one. When you write, your world is populated by the characters you invent and you feel those people filling your lives.

You don’t know how lucky you are, my dear. Don’t waste it with regrets of the places and people you have lost. You have a lifetime to fill, so many good times and good years and great people ahead of you. You must rush to meet it.

If you let anything infringe on your writing time, it will. And you won't get the writing done. Taking one day off can cost me five days of getting back in the mood. Going out to lunch can cost me anywhere from five hours to three days. And for me it's not worth it. For my own sense of well-being I have to finish my work before I can play.

What’s ready? Was Steinback ready? Hemingway? Shakespeare? Dickens? Jane Austen? They just did it, didn’t they?

I never met a chocolate I could not eat.