You small mortals don't realize the power of your stories.

In a way, I think we all want to look to that journalistic voice as a kind of global omniscience, a big eye to correct for our own limited purview: "Here's a realistic accounting of the world in which we live."

Once you figure out what's best for the story, take out the rest.

My favorite classes were always dumb nerdy vocabulary.

When I was younger I used to lock myself in the bathroom and read in the dry tub. I was also a fan of the 'shoe closet.' Reading felt thrilling and illicit and deeply private to me, and I felt vulnerable doing it in public.

I want a real encounter with something true and disconcerting about peoples' natures.

But if you kept thinking about a fight you’d lost, Mom said, you were programming yourself to lose again.