With a book I am the writer and I am also the director and I'm all of the actors and I'm the special effects guy and the lighting technician: I'm all of that. So if it's good or bad, it's all up to me.

Give me a good sharp knife and a good sharp cheese and I’m a happy man.

Does he think to scare me? Arya kissed him where his nose should be and plucked the grave worm from his eye to eat it, but it melted like a shadow in her hand. The yellow skull was melting too, and the kindliest old man that she had ever seen was smiling down on her. "No one has ever tried to eat my worm before," he said. "Are you hungry, child?" Yes, she thought, but not for food.

Sometimes I think everyone is just pretending to be brave, and none of us really are. Maybe pretending is how you get brave, I don't know.

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.

Most have been forgotten. Most deserve to be forgotten. The heroes will always be remembered. The best. The best and the worst. And a few who were a bit of both.

Courage and folly are cousins, or so I’ve heard.