As a lawyer, as a private citizen, you see a lot of injustice. You see a lot of people who should have been punished and are not, and people who were punished wrongfully are not vindicated. Fiction is sort of a way to set the record straight, and let people at least believe that justice can be achieved and the right outcomes can occur.

It's not the beginning or the destination that counts. It's the ride in between.

The military is a very cool world to write about. I went down to Ft. Benning, Ga., for military training, and I learned a lot about soldiers and officers and why they joined up and what their life has been like.

Today might not be so good. But tomorrow, you got another chance to get it right.

I'm scattered, and then that last hundred pages, bam, I'm a laser.

In every thriller written about Washington, particularly after 9/11, there are good guys and there are bad guys, and there's no gray area at all.

It's hard, Cotton. To let yourself love something you know you may never have.