There is a small window of opportunity for freckled girls to tan.

Normality wasn't normal. It couldn't be. If normality were normal, everybody could leave it alone. They could sit back and let normality manifest itself.

Remember that day you said you loved me? Remember that? See, you could do that because you're basically a sane person, who grew up in a loving, sane family. You could take a risk like that. But in my family we didn't go around saying we loved each other. We went around screaming at each other. So what do I do, when you say you love me? I go and undermine it.

Some cities have fallen into ruin and some are built upon ruins but others contain their own ruins while still growing.

I spend most of every day writing. I like to write every day if I can. I don't start extremely early.

The daily act of writing remains as demanding and maddening as it was before, and the pleasure you get from writing - rare but profound - remains at the true heart of the enterprise. On their best days, writers all over the world are winning Pulitzers, all alone in their studios, with no one watching.

When you stood between somebody you loved and death, it was hard to be awake and it was hard to sleep.