The bottom line is that I like my first drafts to be blind, unconscious, messy efforts; that's what gets me the best material.

There's a fine line between thinking about somebody and thinking about not thinking about somebody, but I have the patience and the self-control to walk that line for hours - days, if I have to.

He looks tired, like someone walked on his skin and left footprints.

I'm always happy," Sasha said. "Sometimes I just forget.

If you don't have people that the reader cares about and stories that are gripping, you've got nothing.

I write fiction longhand. That's not so much about rejecting technology as being unable to write fiction on a computer for some reason. I don't think I would write it on a typewriter either. I write in a very blind gut instinctive way. It just doesn't feel right. There's a physical connection. And then in nonfiction that's not the case at all. I can't even imagine writing nonfiction by hand.

The pause makes you think the song will end. And then the song isn't really over, so you're relieved. But then the song does actually end, because every song ends, obviously, and THAT. TIME. THE. END. IS. FOR. REAL.