A writing teacher once told me that the most successful movies and books were simple plots about complex characters. You should be able to articulate your concept in a couple of lines.

In fact, one could argue that the skill of the fiction writer boils down to the ability to exploit intensity.

Structure is translation software for your imagination.

Every hour you spend writing is an hour you don't spend worrying about your writing.

Status, worry and comparison are ways to madness, not victory.

Superb historical romance, with a spiritual theme woven seamlessly throughout. I much enjoyed The Covered Deep and look forward to more from its author!

Think of it as the Doorway of No Return. The feeling must be that your lead character, once she passes through, cannot go home again until the major problem of the plot is solved.

Write like you're in love. Edit like you're in charge.

There's a perilous word fiction writers need to watch out for. The word is 'had.'

The semi-colon is a burp, a hiccup. It's a drunk staggering out of the saloon at 2 a.m., grabbing your lapels on the way and asking you to listen to one more story.

The thing I do at the beginning is a "voice journal," a free form doc that is the character speaking to me. I just work on it until I start to hear different from my own, or the other characters.

You stop worrying about things, just go with the ones you like, and there you'll find happiness and joy.

I have always found that actively loving saves one from a morbid preoccupation with the shortcomings of society.

Giving back or giving forward is the one true law of marketing.

Thinking is to me the greatest fatigue in the world.

When you're a producer or director, there's so much sweat that goes into any given project.

One whispered yes becomes the wind song over an ocean of no's.

A river reaches places its source never knows.

You can put a dog in a scene and everyone's going to be better, I guarantee it. And if they're not better, just shoot the dog.

I think of my work as a kind of peeling back of the wallpaper of today to reveal the histories buried underneath.

If we are not deliberately thinking about our culture and our context, we will be conformed to it without ever knowing.