You learned to accept, or you ended up in a small room writing letters home with Crayolas.

I've killed enough of the world's trees.

You learn best by reading a lot and writing a lot, and the most valuable lessons of all are the ones you teach yourself.

Little kids' minds are very, very strong. They bend. There's a lot of tensile strength and they don't break. We start our kids off on things like "Hansel and Gretel," which features child abandonment, kidnapping, attempted murder, forcible detention, cannibalism, and finally murder by cremation. And the kids love it.

If you can read in the 21st century you own the world.

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.

Terrible thing to live in fear. Brooks Hatlen knew it. Knew it all too well. All I want is to be back where things make sense. Where I won't have to be afraid all the time.