When we read, even if the characters are tragic or sad or disturbing, these are our brothers and sisters in the human family.

When we read, even if the characters are tragic or sad or disturbing, these are our brothers and sisters in the human family.

Every writer can tell you that a book is only truly alive when it finds passionate readers who bring it alive in their imaginations.

Don't plan it all. Let life surprise you a little.

Literature is about being a complex, contradictory human being.

A novel is not, after all, a historical document, but a way to travel through the human heart.

It's like my whole world is coming undone, but when I write, my pencil is a needle and thread, and I'm stitching the scraps back together.