No matter where I was, my compass pointed west. I would always know what time it was in California.

It's all I ever really wanted, that revelation. The possibility of fixed stars.

Don't turn over the rocks if you don't want to see the pale creatures who live under them.

There used to be a category called women's fiction - meaning not too rude, not too much sex, a bit domestic and internal. Women have changed so much. We're so varied. And we've become more interested in the same varied experience in fiction.

Life should always be like this. ... Like lingering over a good meal.

What is a scene? a) A scene starts and ends in one place at one time (the Aristotelian unities of time and place-this stuff goes waaaayyyy back). b) A scene starts in one place emotionally and ends in another place emotionally. Starts angry, ends embarrassed. Starts lovestruck, ends disgusted. c) Something happens in a scene, whereby the character cannot go back to the way things were before. Make sure to finish a scene before you go on to the next. Make something happen.

You can't shape me anymore. I am the uncontrolled element, the random act. I am forward movement in time. You think you can see me? Then tell me, who am I? You don't know.