I'm pleased to have outsold great writers. But I'm not insane - I realize I am a writer people buy to take on vacation.

I don't have ugly ducklings turning into swans in my stories. I have ugly ducklings turning into confident ducks.

I try to make my characters kind of ordinary, somebody that anybody could be. Because we've all had loves, perhaps love and loss, people can relate to my characters.

Nobody is ordinary if you know where to look.

I'm an escapist kind of writer.

Women who start out as ugly ducklings don't become beautiful swans. What they mainly become is confident ducks. They take charge of their lives.

The whole art of life is knowing the right time to say things.

Always write as if you are talking to someone. It works. Don't put on any fancy phrases or accents or things you wouldn't say in real life.

If you don't go to a dance you can never be rejected but you'll never get to dance either.

Because I saw my parents relaxing in armchairs and reading and liking it, I thought it was a peaceful grown-up thing to do, and I still think that.

We are all the heroes and heroines of our own lives. Our love stories are amazingly romantic; our losses and betrayals and disappointments are gigantic in our own minds.

On our way home we throw the apples, the biscuits, the chocolate and the coins in the tall grass by the roadside. It is impossible to throw away the stroking on our hair

Hebrew word for "charity" tzedakah, simply means "justice" and as this suggests, for Jews, giving to the poor is no optional extra but an essential part of living a just life.

Life doesn't come with an eraser. Experiences leave their mark, for better or for worse. Anyone who tells you otherwise has never been hurt.

Life is not governed by will or intention. Life is a question of nerves and fibers and slowly built-up cells in which thought hides itself and passion has its dreams.

The image we have of a famous person often bears no relation to them.

History books that contain no lies are extremely dull.

Why were you so old when we met? I answered with the truth: Age isn't how old you are but how old you feel.

There is a reason it used to be a crime in the Confederate states to teach a slave to read: Literacy is power.

I am satisfied with the dissatisfaction that never rests until it is satisfied and satisfied again.

Let yourself be the person you've secretly always wanted to be