Each genre exerts a considerable spell, as a kind of "form" to be filled, as a Shakespearean sonnet is filled.

In no other sport is the connection between performer and observer so intimate, so frequently painful, so unresolved

Be your own editor/critic. Sympathetic but merciless!

Keep a light, hopeful heart. But ­expect the worst.

It is important for me to discover the ideal title, for without this title the story or novel isn't quite in focus.

Betrayal is the deepest wound. Betrayal is what remains of love, when love has gone.

I have forced myself to begin writing when I've been utterly exhausted, when I've felt my soul as thin as a playing card…and somehow the activity of writing changes everything.