I'm perfectly capable of being stupid on my own.

People, particularly big men carrying big rifles, don't expect lip from a scrawny thing like me. They always look a bit dazed when they get it.

Grief had its own life, took its own sustenance.

Don't argue. Never deign to deny. Meet insults with laughter.

And there's nothing wrong with being a lizard either. Unless you were born to be a hawk.

Oh, and the easiest way to make someone furious is to tell her to calm down.

My stories usually begin with the characters and some elements of how power (personal, political, magical) functions in the world. The rest develops as I write, and research helps a great deal with that. If you're going to write about an agrarian economy, research agrarian economies. If your main character is starving, then you should know what it means for a malnourished body to break down.