Every talent is unearned, however, and with it comes a solemn obligation to use it as fully and as wisely as possible.

Not funny ha ha, funny weird.

Are you prepared for the first wound?

Every life is complicated, every mind a kingdom of unmapped mysteries.

When tempest tossed, embrace chaos

Writing a novel is like making love, but it's also like having a tooth pulled. Pleasure and pain. Sometimes it's like making love while having a tooth pulled.

Little mouse, you were so quick, so bright, so sweet, so full of life. And you still are everything you were then. None of it’s lost forever. All that promise, all that hope, that love and goodness—it’s still inside you. No one can take the gifts God gave you. Only you.