And if I'm guilty of having gratuitous sex, then I'm also guilty of having gratuitous violence, and gratuitous feasting, and gratuitous description of clothes, and gratuitous heraldry, because very little of this is necessary to advance the plot. But my philosophy is that plot advancement is not what the experience of reading fiction is about. If all we care about is advancing the plot, why read novels? We can just read Cliffs Notes.

A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies.

Every man should lose a battle in his youth, so he does not lose a war when he is old.

I think my very earliest stories were all intellectual exercises and I was writing from experiences I had never had about characters who were about an inch deep.

Perhaps I cannot make my people good, she told herself, but I should at least try to make them a little less bad.

True knights protect the weak.” He snorted. “There are no true knights, no more than there are gods. If you can’t protect yourself, die and get out of the way of those who can. Sharp steel and strong arms rule this world, don’t ever believe any different.” Sansa backed away from him. “You’re awful.” “I’m honest. It’s the world that’s awful.

For they are the knights of summer, and winter is coming.