Good writing is good writing, and I'm so happy when I read it.

Twitter," said Manny, waving his hand. "You know what that is? Termites with microphones.

You stayed around your children as long as you could, inhaling the ambient gold shavings of their childhood, and at the last minute you tried to see them off into life and hoped that the little piece of time you’d given them was enough to prevent them from one day feeling lonely and afraid and hopeless. You wouldn’t know the outcome for a long time.

The only option for a creative person was constant motion—a lifetime of busy whirligigging in a generally forward direction, until you couldn’t do it any longer.

Wasn't the whole point of being an artist, or at least part of it, that you didn't have to wear a tie?

Both my mother and I have close groups of friends that include other writers, and these friendships are very important to us.

Everybody has a theme. You talk to somebody awhile, and you realize they have one particular thing that rules them. The best you can do is a variation on the theme, but that's about it.