Writing a novel is actually searching for victims. As I write I keep looking for casualties. The stories uncover the casualties.

And I find - I'm 63, and my capacity to be by myself and just spend time by myself hasn't diminished any. That's the necessary part of being a writer, you better like being alone.

A sentence boiled in her, but she could not yet see it clearly.

We often need to lose sight of our priorities in order to see them.

And I don't want to begin something, I don't want to write that first sentence until all the important connections in the novel are known to me. As if the story has already taken place, and it's my responsibility to put it in the right order to tell it to you.

I've always been a fan of the 19th century novel, of the novel that is plotted, character-driven, and where the passage of time is almost as central to the novel as a major minor character, the passage of time and its effect on the characters in the story.

Rituals are comforting; rituals combat loneliness.