The only two kinds of books could earn an American writer a living are cookbooks and detective novels.

Labels are for the things men make, not for men. The most primitive man is too complex to be labeled.

I still can't decide which is more fun - reading or writing.

I love books, food, music, sleep, people who work, heated arguments, the United States of America, and my wife and children. I dislike politicians, preachers, genteel persons, people who do not work or are on vacation, closed minds, movies, loud noises, and oiliness.

The constant petty behests of life permit few opportunities for major satisfactions, and when one is offered it should be seized.

I'm not a collector. I don't keep letters, or books, or souvenirs. But I do keep one copy of each translation of my books into a foreign language. Have you ever seen a murder story printed in Singhalese? Wow!

Man's brain, enlarged fortuitously, invented words in an ambitious attempt to learn how to think, only to have them usurped by his emotions. But we still try.