You have to be an outsider to write.

Mystery books. I must read a hundred a year. . . I just wish some of them were harder to figure out.

Happiness is the maximum agreement of reality and desire.

High Concept means a book or a film whose core idea can be stated in a single sentence, such as Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito are twins. Or, Arnold is pregnant.

Of course the biggest mafia in Russia has always been the government; in Soviet times, the Communist Party, and now a circle of former KGB and FSB.

The great thing about being a writer is that you are always recreating yourself.

The research is the most interesting part… That’s how I work. I go some place and I walk it and I talk to people until I find what I’ve come for. Or not. Fortunately, I tend to find what I’m after.