My father was often impatient during March, waiting for winter to end, the cold to ease, the sun to reappear. March was an unpredictable month, when it was never clear what might happen. Warm days raised hopes until ice and grey skies shut over the town again.

Don't write about what you know - write about what you're interested in. Don't write about yourself - you aren't as interesting as you think.

We say very little, for we do not need to. We are silent together, each in her own world, knowing the other is just at her back.

The sign of a masterpiece: A painting when there's a lack of resolution.

I had walked along that street all my life, but had never been so aware that my back was to my home

So many (too many) books are published every year, and it seems everyone is writing a book. Perhaps we should all be reading more and writing less!

He saw things in a way that others did not, so that a city I had lived in all my life seemed a different place, so that a woman became beautiful with the light on her face.