I looked back at some of my earlier published stories with genuine horror and remorse. I got thinking, How many extant copies might there be, who owns them, and do they keep their doors locked?

At the risk of appearing disingenuous, I don't really think of myself as 'writing humor.' I'm simply reporting on the world I observe, which is frequently hilarious.

And there comes a time in your life when you realize that if you don't take the opportunity to be happy, you may never get another chance again.

People sometimes get in the habit of being loyal to a mistake.

You use simple brushstrokes in a screenplay for things over which you would take much greater pains in a novel.

Have you ever noticed that when people use the expression 'I have to say', what follows usually needn't be said?

What if all everybody needed in the world was to be sure of one friend? What if you were the one, and you refused to say those simple words?

My books are elegiac in the sense that they're odes to a nation that even I sometimes think may not exist anymore except in my memory and my imagination.

Worse, I have to admit to feeling the jealousy of one crab for another that has managed to climb out of the barrel.

Bookstores, like libraries, are the physical manifestation of the wide world's longest, most thrilling conversation.

I was the one who did come through that door. You were the one she was waiting for.

Think like magician, present like magician and perform like magician.

Reality is created by the mind. We can change our reality by changing our mind.

They are a very extensive minority who have suffered discrimination and who have the same right to participation in the promise and fruits of society as every other individual.

Damn your principles! Stick to your party.

If you want to be liberated, if you choose to be what I am, then you've chosen freedom. You can do this.

My father was totally Irish, and so I went to Ireland once. I found it to be very much like New York, for it was a beautiful country, and both the women and men were good-looking.

She heard pa shouting,"Jiminy crickets!It's raining fish-hooks and hammer handles!

Heaven is a place nearby, so there's no need to say goodbye.

I’d learned that my mother was a badass in disguise. She was Van Helsing in an apron and heels, and—at least for the time being—I couldn’t think of a single thing cooler than that.

I will be gutted if Roy does go because I would far rather he stayed at Old Trafford. (on Roy Keane leaving Manchester United)