The storytelling gift is innate: one has it or one doesn't. But style is at least partly a learned thing: one refines it by looking and listening and reading and practice - by work.

But it's for every writer to decide his own pace, and the pace varies with the writer and the work

It happened in New York, April 10th, nineteen years ago. Even my hand balks at the date. I had to push to write it down, just to keep the pen moving on the paper. It used to be a perfectly ordinary day, but now it sticks up on the calendar like a rusty nail.

Children - if you think back really what it was like to be a child and what it was like to know other children - children lie all the time

Children love secret club houses. They love secrecy even when there's no need for secrecy

In short: I felt my existence was tainted, in some subtle but essential way.

Even if you need, and want, a second opinion, it can be dangerous to have people telling you what they think you ought to add, or cut, before you've even finished telling your story. One loses heart; one loses energy and interest. Or at least I do.