I started out of course with Hemingway when I learned how to write. Until I realized Hemingway doesn't have a sense of humor. He never has anything funny in his stories.

Keep your exclamation points under control. You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose.

I want the reader to know what's going on. So there's never a mystery in my books.

I once saw Dizzy Gillespie at a live show, and it made me want to go home immediately and start writing.

If you take a few days to write an outline, you're just making up scenes that you think will work, that you think will be interesting. But as you write it, other ideas occur - better ideas that have to do with what you're writing.

My most important piece of advice to all you would-be writers: when you write, try to leave out all the parts readers skip.

There are cities that get by on their good looks, offer climate and scenery, views of mountains or oceans, rockbound or with palm trees. And there are cities like Detroit that have to work for a living.