It gets cold in the desert at night, particularly up in the mountains; the stars hammer on the rock and strike frost.

I like writing about women, weak and strong, pathetic and heroic. I like writing about men, ditto. And all the variants of men and women, beasts and demons.

Writers tell stories better, because they've had more practice, but everyone has a book in them. Yes, that old cliche.

The other writer who had a very important early influence on me when I was about 17 was C.S. Lewis.

I think of myself as a storyteller, and that is it.

Whatever the hell I am, I am Me.

I held out my book. It was precious to me, as were all the things I'd written; even where I despised their inadequacy there was not one I would disown. Each tore its way from my entrails. Each had shortened my life, killed me with its own special little death.