You need to learn to write on demand, and to get critiqued without flinching. When someone can rip your work to shreds without it feeling as though your arm has been hacked off, you're ready to send your novel off to an agent.
Jodi PicoultThe nurses, I have already learned, are the ones who give us the answers weโre desperate for. Unlike the doctors, who fidget like they need to be somewhere else, the nurses patiently answer us as if we are the first set of parents to ever have this kind of meeting with them, instead of the thousandth.
Jodi PicoultJust when you think you've got your life by the reins, that's when it's most likely to run away with you.
Jodi Picoult