I am, of course, romanticizing; a chronic tendency of mine.

You don't have to like your family, you don't even have to spend time with them, to know them right down to the bone.

When we can't see a pattern, we fit pieces together until one takes shape, because we have to.

There's a Spanish proverb," he said, "that's always fascinated me. "Take what you want and pay for it, says God.'" "I don't believe in God," Daniel said, "but that principle seems, to me, to have a divinity of its own; a kind of blazing purity. What could be simpler, or more crucial? You can have anything you want, as long as you accept that there is a price and that you will have to pay it.

I thought I could never write a proper book; I'd never done it before. But I thought I could write a sequence. Then I had a chapter. The next thing I knew I was turning acting down.

Sometimes, when you're close to someone, you miss things. Other people can see them, but you can't.

I hate nostalgia, it's laziness with prettier accessories.