Her laughter was a shiny thing, like pewter flung high in the air.

Once he had drawn first blood, his war against the property of the state lost all its moral resonance.

Good writing is the hardest form of thinking.

Walking the streets of Charleston in the late afternoons of August was like walking through gauze or inhaling damaged silk.

A recipe is a story that ends with a good meal.

Few things linger longer or become more indwelling than that feeling of both completion and emptiness when a great book ends. That the book accompanies the reader forever from that day forward is part of literature's profligate generosity.

What's important is that a story changes every time you say it out loud. When you put it on paper, it can never change. But the more times you tell it, the more changes will occur. A story is a living thing; it moves and shifts