I think we rarely recognize the fifth business in our lives at the time those people are changing us.

Come to a book as you would come to an unexplored land. Come without a map. Explore it, and draw your own map.... A book is like a pump. It gives nothing unless first you give to it.

There's a saying - "Write what you know." It's bad advice if you take it as an unbreakable rule, but good advice if you use it as a foundation.

God wiped snot out of his nose and that was you.

That was what I wanted, but I don't need it to be gone. I can love you and I can love life and bear the pain all at the same time. I think the pain might even make the rest better, the way a good setting can make a diamond look better.

Fantasy has a better chance of lasting than a lot of other things. The Hobbit and the Narnia books, they seem to get handed down father to son, mother to daughter. Because they're set in a fantasy world, they can remain relevant.

Schizoid behavior is a pretty common thing in children. It's accepted, because all we adults have this unspoken agreement that children are lunatics.