The ugliest truth, in the end, was still better than the prettiest of lies.

I'm not very happy idle. There's always this voice in my head that says, 'I should be writing.

Being a parent is not for the faint of heart. I may joke about knowing fear, but the fact is, the first time I ever knew real fear was the day Charlotte, my first child, was born. Suddenly there is someone in the world you care about more than anything.

There are three things that make a person a writer: inspiration, perspiration and desperation.

The first sip of beer on a hot day is like that first finger-dip when you open a new jar of peanut butter.

Only bad writers think they're good.

Writing my first book, I think in hindsight I went into it saying, 'It's gonna sell.' I was earning enough to scrape by sometime around a book or two before 'Tell No One.' I moved up from $50,000 to $75,000, then $150,000 for each book. I had never thought I would be doing anything else. I had enough encouragement.