I work continuously within the shadow of failure. For every novel that makes it to my publisher's desk, there are at least five or six that died on the way. And even with the ones I do finish, I think of all the ways they might have been better.

How easy it was to make people happy, when you didn't want or need anything from them.

During the act of writing I have told myself something that I didn't know I knew.

I work continuously within the shadow of failure. For every novel that makes it to my publisher's desk, there are at least five or six that died on the way. And even with the ones I do finish, I think of all the ways they might have been better.

Dreams say what they mean, but they don't say it in daytime language.

At times ... one is downright thankful for the self-absorption of other people.

Much of the activity we think of as writing is, actually, getting ready to write.