You have to believe in yourself despite the evidence.

After finishing the first draft, I work for as long as it takes (for two or three weeks, most often) to rework that first draft on a computer. Usually that involves expansion: filling in and adding to, but trying not to lose the spontaneous, direct sound. I use that first draft as a touchstone to make sure everything else in that section has the same sound, the same tone and impression of spontaneity.

I began writing seriously in my mid-20s and didnt publish my first book until I was 41.

It seems to me nothing man has done or built on this land is an improvement over what was here before.

Honey, Maggie Jones said. Victoria. Listen to me. You're here now. This is where you are.

This country's crazy in terms of fame and what people think it means. They expect a writer to be something between a Hollywood starlet and the village idiot.

He wanted to think of words that would make some difference but there were none in any language he knew that were sufficient to the moment or that would change a single thing.