She smiles at him, too young to know him for a stranger, and too innocent yet to care.

Most of the news about the state of the environment is pretty ugly. This is frightening for me personally, but actually motivational for me artistically.

But then, that was the problem with pretty toy stitches. When real life got hold of them, they always tore out.

Killing isn't free. It takes something out of you every time you do it. You get their life; they get a piece of your soul. It's always a trade.

At some point, you realize you can't provide a perfectly monolithic description of a foreign culture's future any more than you can provide a monolithic description of your own hometown's future. Your choices about what to emphasize and what to leave out make all the difference, and ultimately, your fingerprints and biases and viewpoints are going to be all over the story.

A desert's a stupid place to put a river.

Laws are a fine thing on paper, but painful when no bribery can ease their bind.