So much of the past in encapsulated in the odds and ends. Most of us discard more information about ourselves than we ever care to preserve. Our recollection of the past is not simply distorted by our faulty perception of events remembered but skewed by those forgotten. The memory is like twin orbiting stars, one visible, one dark, the trajectory of what's evident forever affected by the gravity of what's concealed.

I figure guys are like Whitman's Samplers. I like to take a little bite out of each and then move on before the whole box gets stale.

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

Sometimes being fooled by love is worth the price. At least you know you're alive and capable of feeling, even if all you end up with is chest pain.

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.

I made the rules I figured I could be the one to break them. I thought I would write about xenophobia, a hatred of foreigners. After I stated writing the story there was not a foreigner to be had. I did not want to just stick one in there so I could get a title out of it since it seemed like cheating. I never figured out how I could get out of this dilemma so I just called it X and weaved X traits into the story.

My father taught me to love detective fiction writers such as Raymond Chandler. When I decided to have a hard-boiled detective series I did a lot of studying before I wrote the first book. I learned police procedure, the California criminal law, and many areas outside my expertise.