My father had taught me - mostly by example - that if a man wanted to be in charge of his life, he had to be in charge of his problems.

You know what talent is? The curse of expectation. As a kid you have to deal with that, beat it somehow. If you can write, you think God put you on earth to blow Shakespeare away. Or if you can paint, maybe you think--I did--that God put you on earth to blow your father away.

Now panic beats and flutters inside my skull like a flock of starlings locked in an attic.

The only wat to get better at writing is to write. And read.

I never saw any of my dad's stories. My mother said he had piles and piles of manuscripts.

I start work around 8 a.m. and usually finish around noon. If there's more to do, I do it in the late afternoon, although that isn't prime time for me.

You are the grim, goal-oriented ones who will not believe that the joy is in the journey rather than the destination no matter how many times it has been proven to you.