I have more self-doubt than any writer I've ever known.... The positive aspect of self-doubt - if you can channel it into useful activity instead of being paralyzed by it - is that by the time you reach the end of a novel, you know precisely why you made every decision in the narrative, the multiple purposes of every metaphor and image.

The answer to the mystery of existence is the love you shared sometimes so imperfectly, and when the loss wakes you to the deeper beauty of it, to the sanctity of it, you can't get off your knees for a long time, you're driven to your knees not by the weight of the loss but by gratitude for what preceded the loss.

Your sense of responsibility to others can never be excessive.

I fall down on the side of free will, simply because if you look at where I came from, and what I was able to do in my life, what was able to happen.

The opportunity to love a dog and to treat it with kindness is an opportunity for a lost and selfish heart to be redeemed. They are powerless and innocent, and it is how we treat the humblest among us that surely determines the fate of our souls

I just became fascinated with how complex and unlikely the universe is and life is and Catholicism gives me an answer to that.

Y'all take care of yourself now... strange and interesting friends are hard to find.