I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs, and I will shout it from the rooftops.

Small towns harbor small imaginations.

The quiet, singing voice of the rose. The song that promised all might be well, all might be well, that all manner of things might be well.

What's been tried once had been tried once before... and before... and before...

But there's one thing I'm sure about. An opening line should invite the reader to begin the story. It should say: Listen. Come in here. You want to know about this.

I started writing seriously when I was about 12. I am always in the mood.

At the time we’re stuck in it, like hostages locked in a Turkish bath, high school seems the most serious business in the world to just about all of us. It’s not until the second or third class reunion that we start realizing how absurd the whole thing was.