This is a slow business to have success in. There are exceptions, but for the most part it's kind of like the last writer standing.... I've got gray. I've got plenty of gray. I'm creating a career slowly, like a coral reef.

I live for those rare and delicious moments when the words on the page take off and I am the bystander, watching as the tale shows me what will happen next.

For honest insight into who you are, don't ask yourself what your priorities are for next week. Ask what your priorities were last week.

In a novella, a whole lot of crap can happen, and you can build momentum and suspense and leave room for a surprise or three. Stories are cut down to the most essential elements, and novels (this might be an unfair generalization on my part) are big fat clumsy efforts where the reader can snooze for a couple chapters and miss nothing of consequence. Hence my love for the middle way.

How could anyone survive even a single day, if he didn't feel as if he was, in some little great way, needed?

A community that learns together excels together. We need to form communities that learn together.

A community is a small group working together. Community scales by adding groups, and building connections between them, not enlarging them.