There's a feeling about it. You feel almost like a cabinetmaker, laying planks. There's a real feeling when you know you're getting it right. It's a physical feeling.

The Senate is an unknowing world

As you get older, you sometimes feel that it's harder and harder to get something new and wonderful to come into your life.

You have to be an extremely good reader to appreciate what a good writer is. There are some people who are completely insensitive to good writing.

Whenever I go to work I wear a jacket and a tie, because I'm inherently quite lazy, and my books take so long to do, and my publishers don't bug me, so it's so easy to fool yourself into thinking you're working harder than you really are.

I think President Obama has done more than he is given credit for.

I try to have a mood or a rhythm for a chapter.