Lying contains the same hostile elements as a practical joke in that the 'victim' ends up looking foolish in his own eyes and laughable in everyone else's.

Sometimes I claim I write because I put in an application at Sears and they've never called back.

Ideas are easy. It's the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats.

Having reached the halfway mark in the alphabet, my prime focus is on writing each new book as well as I can.

My notion of an elegant table is you don't leave the knife sticking out of the mayonnaise jar.

You kill people you hate or you kill in rage or you kill to get even, but you don't kill someone you're indifferent to.

My primary lesson, however, was that I'm a solo writer, happiest when I'm making all the executive decisions. I've always been willing to rise or fall on my own merits.