Life was such a strange thing, so permanent when one had it, so fleeting when it was lost- and those who lost it could never tell you what it was like, could they?

You learn to write the same way you learn to play golf... You do it, and keep doing it until you get it right. A lot of people think something mystical happens to you, that maybe the muse kisses you on the ear. But writing isn’t divinely inspired – it’s hard work.

In battle, you forgive a man anything except an unwillingness to take risks. Sometimes you have to put it on the line.

Christ, how did you ever get this screwed up! his mind demanded of him. He knew the answer, but even that was not a full explanation. Different segments of the organism called John Terrance Kelly knew different parts of the whole story, but somehow they'd never all come together, leaving the separate fragments of what had ...once been a tough, smart, decisive and to blunder about in confusion - and despair! There was a happy thought.

Once you stop believing in Santa Claus, the whole world just goes downhill.

I wanted to see my name on the cover of a book. If your name is in the Library of Congress, you're immortal.

There are only two ways we can be beaten: we die or we give up. And we're not giving up.