You can never read your own book with the innocent anticipation that comes with that first delicious page of a new book, because you wrote the thing. You've been backstage. You've seen how the rabbits were smuggled into the hat. Therefore ask a reading friend or two to look at it before you give it to anyone in the publishing business. This friend should not be someone with whom you have a ­romantic relationship, unless you want to break up.

When you're unhinged, things make their way out of you that should be kept inside, and other things get in that ought to be shut out. The locks lose their powers. The guards go to sleep. The passwords fail.

I wanted to forget the past, but it refused to forget me; it waited for sleep, then cornered me.

My good intentions are completely lethal.

The thing about delirium is you think it's great, but it actually isn't.

How easy it is to invent a humanity, for anyone at all.

The scroll is coming back (Twitter is a scroll.)