...pain reaches a certain point and does not get worse but remains in all its intensity and you can survive it.

It's amazing that the heart makes no noise when it cracks.

As much as there is joy in writing, there's always the little bit of terror to keep you on edge, on your toes. It is a strange way to occupy yourself - to enjoy your life on a daily basis. There is no guarantee that something great is going to come next.

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

And he did see--that life was rotten, that there were no heroes, really, and that you couldn't trust anybody, not even yourself.

The rewriting is always crucial to what I do; whenever I do a scene, I always tell myself that this isn't final and that I can do it again, better. The pacing is probably from experience. I've always liked gradual disclosure. I keep thinking of my rubber-band theory. You have a rubber band that you keep pulling and pulling and pulling, and just at the moment of snapping you release it and start another chapter and start pulling again.

I simply write with an intelligent reader in mind. I don't think about how old they are.