Gaia spins on, silently contemplating what it means to be born into a sarcastic universe.

Change is the principal feature of our age and literature should explore how people deal with it. The best science fiction does that, head-on.

If you have other things in your life-family, friends, good productive day work-these can interact with your writing and the sum will be all the richer.

Patience is fine, but I'm not going to stop asking the Universe to make sense!

I regret having been the bearer of ambiguous tidings.

When I begin a book, I inevitably discover many things along the way, about the characters, their past histories and the political intrigues that surround them. This discovery process is vital, and I would not prejudice it by deciding too much in advance

Beware of self-indulgence. The romance surrounding the writing profession carries several myths: that one must suffer in order to be creative; that one must be cantankerous and objectionable in order to be bright; that ego is paramount over skill; that one can rise to a level from which one can tell the reader to go to hell. These myths, if believed, can ruin you. If you believe you can make a living as a writer, you already have enough ego.