When people say they write for themselves, that's probably what they do. I will admit that I don't write for myself; I write to be read. I've got the reader in my mind all the time.

People always ask me about the role models that I'm providing for kids, and I say I can't be concerned with that. I'm not worrying about corrupting youth. I'm worrying about writing realistically and truthfully to affect the reader.

I write very tightly, and my big fear is boring people. I want them to read quickly, stopped in their tracks. I resist indulging myself.

I am frightened by today's world, terrified by it. I think that comes out in the books. I'm afraid of big things. Some of these schools have three thousand kids, and even the size of the schools frightens me. Big government frightens me; so does big defense.

Cities fell. Earth opened. Planets tilted. Stars plummeted. And the awful silence.

You could reason with someone who was halfway educated and appeal to his intelligence, but I felt helpless in the face of utter stupidity.

The beautiful part of writing is that you don't have to get it right the first time, unlike, say, a brain surgeon. You can always do it better, find the exact word, the apt phrase, the leaping simile.