There were two things going on: 1) I had already established in my own mind where I wanted to go with the next series, and having James around as a Grey Eminence would have complicated matters. He had had an amazing life and it was time to bid him good-bye.

Never underestimate the potential for human stupidity when wealth and power are at stake.

Jigsaw Lady is the working title of a science fiction novel I've had in my head for darn near 15 years. I think I'll start work on it next year (in all my spare time) but I'd like to get it finished some day.

Friends can betray you, but with an old enemy, you always know where you stand.

The world is much larger than I once dreamed, or perhaps my place in it is smaller than I once realized.

There is no idea so brilliant or original that a sufficiently-untalented writer can't screw it up.

My dear dead mother wanted me to go into an honorable trade, like grave robbing. Would I listen? No. Be an assassin, like your uncle Gustav, she said. Would I pay heed? No. Apprentice to the Necromancer―