I tell beginning readers to read a lot and write a lot. If you want to write a book, find a subject that's really worth the time and effort you'll put in.

I want my prose to be as clear as a pane of glass.

I always want to write something better than the last book.

My big struggle is how people can not care, erase, not remember.

I think if the writing comes too easily, it shows - it's usually hard to read.

At first, I spend about four hours a day writing. Toward the end of a book, I spend up to 16 hours a day on it, because all I want to do is make it good and get it done.

Writing is revision. All prose responds to work.