Fiction is lies; we're writing about people who never existed and events that never happened when we write fiction, whether its science fiction or fantasy or western mystery stories or so-called literary stories. All those things are essentially untrue. But it has to have a truth at the core of it.

Catelyn had never liked this godswood. She had been born a Tully, at Riverrun far to the south, on the Red Fork of the Trident. The godswood there was a garden, bright and airy, where tall redwoods spread dappled shadows across tinkling streams, birds sang from hidden nests, and the air was spicy with the scent of flowers.

Why do the Gods make kings and queens if not to protect the ones who can't protect themselves?

I never finished any of my early stories. They were all beginnings, an endless number of beginnings.

One of the hardest parts of writing is writing from the gut or the heart or something like that rather than intellectually.

And what lesson can we draw from Volantene history? If you want to conquer the world, you best have dragons.

There's no shame in fear, my father told me, what matters is how we face it.