I'm continually astonished with myself how different people bring out things in me that I never knew I had inside me. Each new friendship can make you a new person, because it opens up new doors inside of you.

I need to write, and I can't write when I'm on the road.

If the world held magic powerful enough to make the elephant appear, then there must exist, too, magic in equal measure, magic powerful enough to undo what had been done.

Farewell” is not the word that you would like to hear from your mother as you are being led to the dungeon by 2 oversize mice in black hoods. Words that you would like to hear are “Take me instead, I will go to the dungeon in my sons place.” There is a great deal of comfort in those words.

The undoing is almost always more difficult than the doing.

I grew up in Florida, and I wanted to go home and I couldn't. I didn't have the money. The book [The Tiger Rising] was a way to go home.

My favorite six letter word is always because it promises so much. My favorite five letter word is never because it insists on contradicting the promise. My favorite four letter word is once because it says it happened then. My favorite three letter word is yes because I’m just now learning to say it to my heart. My favorite two letter word is if because it makes all things possible like this: If not always If not never Then once. Yes.