Must you write complete sentences each time, every time? Perish the thought. If your work consists only of fragments and floating clauses, the Grammar Police aren't going to come and take you away. Even William Strunk, that Mussolini of rhetoric, recognized the delicious pliability of language. "It is an old observation," he writes, "that the best writers sometimes disregard the rules of rhetoric." Yet he goes on to add this thought, which I urge you to consider: "Unless he is certain of doing well, [the writer] will probably do best to follow the rules."

I was being paid to do what I loved, and there's no gig on earth better than that; it's like a license to steal.

The sandwich he made was bologna and cheese, his favorite. All the sandwiches he made were his favorites; that was one of the advantages of being single.

I'm a salami writer. I try to write good salami, but salami is salami.

I identify with the characters very closely. At the same time that I`m outside, writing, I`m also inside, experiencing, and it can be very unsettling.

If there is love, smallpox scars are as pretty as dimples. I'll love your face no matter what it looks like. Because it's yours.

I still believe in the resilience of the human heart and the essential validity of love;I still believe that connections between people can be made and that the spirits which inhabit us sometimes touch. I still believe that the cost of these connections is horribly, outrageously high... and I still believe that the value received far outweighs the price which must be paid. (From introductory notes.)