There can be no better grounding for a lifetime as an author than to see humanity in all its various guises through the lens of the reporter for the town.

Just because someone's a member of an ethnic minority doesn't mean they're not a nasty small-minded little jerk [...]

She was beautiful, but she was beautiful in the way a forest fire was beautiful: something to be admired from a distance, not up close.

History tends to change people who think they're changing it.

It's an interesting fact that fewer than 17 % of Real cats end their lives with the same name they started with. Much family effort goes into selecting one at the start ("She looks like a Winnifred to me"), and the as the years roll by it suddenly finds itself being called Meepo or Ratbag.

If you have let pride get the better of you, then you have already lost, but if you grab pride by the scruff of the neck and ride it like a stallion, then you may have already won.

And all the stories had, somewhere, the witch. The wicked old witch. And Tiffany had thought: Where's the evidence?