Stephen King. Now I'm not crazy about him, but he's a great a writer.

Nobody reads a mystery to get to the middle. They read it to get to the end. If it's a letdown, they won't buy anymore. The first page sells that book. The last page sells your next book.

I'm a country boy. I hate New York. But that's where things happen, so I use it as a base for stories, I know enough about it. But I have to keep going back there.

Where I am they can smell out a hurricane. My house survived Hurricane Hazel, but it didn't get past Hugo.

I'm a commercial writer, not an author. Margaret Mitchell was an author. She wrote one book.

If the public likes you, you're good.

I wrote the original Mike Hammer as a comic, Mike Danger.