There are hearts, reader, that never mend again once they are broken. Or if they do mend, they heal themselves in a crooked and lopsided way, as if sewn together by a careless craftsman.

Writing is seeing. It is paying attention.

The book [The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane] is about the fact that living in this world means that your heart is necessarily going to get broken. But the book also says that's okay. That's the only way to live a truly human life - with your heart getting broken - and eventually getting flooded with love.

I write two pages - that's all I write. It takes me about an hour. I've learned that's all I'm capable of and to push myself beyond that is foolhardy. It's a very delicate thing, and I will not abuse it. So I write two pages, then I get up from the computer.

I love words; I love the way they sound. Once I've worked on everything else, the last drafts of my books come down to how they sound.

Life was so short; so many beautiful things slipped away.

I think I'm succinct to the point of trying to write the two-word novel. Editing my work almost never means taking anything out but rather adding, because I'm always stripping down. I tend to under-write rather than over-write.