The last good time always comes, and when you see the darkness creeping toward you, you hold on to what was bright and good. You hold on for dear life.

You see something, then it clicks with something else, and it will make a story. But you never know when it's going to happen.

The monster nevers dies.

If you don't have time to read, you don't have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.

As always, the blessed relief of starting, a feeling that was like falling into a hole filled with bright light. As always, the glum knowledge that he would not write as well as he wanted to write. As always the terror of not being able to finish, of accelerating into a brick wall. As always, the marvelous joyful nervy feeling of journey begun.

Waiting rooms were made for books-of course! But so are theater lobbies before the show, long and boring checkout lines, and everyone's favorite, the john.

Bad writing is more than a matter of (expletive deleted) syntax and faulty observation; bad writing usually arises from a stubborn refusal to tell stories about what people actually do to face the fact, let us say, that murderers sometimes help old ladies cross the street.