She was a beautiful woman dragging a crippled foot and I was that foot. I was bricks sewn into the hem of her clothes, I was a steel dress

I'm always looking for something new and interesting to say. And it can't be something I'm directly experiencing.

A cliche is like a coin that has been handled too much. Once language has been overly handled, it no longer leaves a clear imprint.

Always tell us where we are. And don't just tell us where something is, make it pay off. Use description of landscape to help you establish the emotional tone of the scene. Keep notes of how other authors establish mood and foreshadow events by describing the world around the character. Look at the openings of Fitzgerald stories, and Graham Greene, they're great at this.

I'm incredibly restless. I read a lot of poetry. I also find myself reading the first 20 pages of everything, looking for something. And you know what? I'm usually looking for the book I'm writing. And it's not out there!

This was the life I was going to be living, everybody separated from everybody else, hanging on for a moment only to be washed away.

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.