Because I’ve gotten older, I worry that there will be a steep decline in my talent, but I promise not to let the same thing happen to my passion for writing.

Among the worst things about growing old is the loss of those irreplaceable friends who added richness and depth to your life.

I envy the tireless intimacy of women’s friendship, its lastingness, and its unbendable strength.

I don’t know when reading books became the most essential thing about me, but it happened over the years and I found myself the most willing servant of what I considered a rich habit.

Moonrise is a fabulous novel and my damn wife wrote it and that’s me up there near Highlands shouting it out to the hills.

It eases my soul that I share a house with [Cassandra King] a novelist of such rare and distinctive gifts.

My father managed to change his entire life after I wrote a novel about his brutal regime as a family man. It took resoluteness and courage for my father to change, and I need to acknowledge that.

It’s the great surprise of my life that I ended up loving [my father] so much.

I have always been attracted to male writers who can demonstrate their love and affection for women with ease, yet not draw attention to themselves.

I have read like a man on fire my whole life because the genius of English teachers touched me with the dazzling beauty of language.

I have yet to meet an English teacher who assigned a book to damage a kid.

Why haven't I got a husband and children?" mused Greta Garbo to the Dutchess of Windsor, "I never met a man I could marry.

You take up the spiritual path only when you feel you cannot do otherwise.

Ugliness is a point of view; an ulcer is wonderful to a pathologist.

There is no neutral ground in the universe. Every square inch, every split second is claimed by God, and counterclaimed by Satan.

The bolt of Tash falls from above!' 'Does it ever get caught on a hook halfway?

You know what I would do? I would remake The Wizard of Oz with Robin Williams, and that's it. Just let him do the whole dang thing by himself.

Phlegmatic natures can be inspired to enthusiasm only by being made into fanatics.

Rather suffer an injustice than commit one.

Where there is no standard, there can be no improvement. For these reasons, standards are the basis for both maintenance and improvement

I don’t write things to benefit the world. If it happens that they do, swell. I didn’t set out to do that. I set out to have a hell of a lot of fun.