This dazzling, unput-downable debut novel proves beyond a doubt that Dan Wells has the gift. His teenage protagonist is as chilling as he is endearing. More John Wayne Cleaver, please.

If you come to a fight thinking it will be a fair one, you didn't come prepared.

This dazzling, unput-downable debut novel proves beyond a doubt that Dan Wells has the gift. His teenage protagonist is as chilling as he is endearing. More John Wayne Cleaver, please.

Reality is what trips you up when you walk around with your eyes closed.

Some people never learn how to talk to kids. They turn up the volume and enunciate with extra care, as if talking to a partially deaf immigrant. They sound as if they're reading lines somebody else wrote for them, or as if what they're saying is really for the benefit of other adults listening and not just for the child. Kids sense that and turn off.

My genre-hopping has caused problems with marketing and sales departments over the years, because they need to know where to position a book with the booksellers.

I love seeing the light go on in aspiring writers' eyes when you point out ways to improve their prose or their story - when they get it.