Open your soul and put it out there and dare the world to read it, ready to have them stomp on you and laugh, but ready to do it again the next day.

Believe in yourself and start achieving your dream. It waits for you on the other side of the publish button.

Honesty makes stories real and characters memorable. From there, taking them to where they need to go will be all the development they need.

You have to put yourself out there as a writer, you can’t play it safe.

Kids are flat-out freaking hilarious if you are paying attention. Not just my kid, but every kid.

The best part of being a writer is you get to tell people you’re a writer. That’s still considered cool.

Who do I think would appreciate my book?I’m surprised anybody does. Oops, did I say that out loud?

I wasn’t a class clown, because nuns have no sense of humor. They have rulers.

It’s amazing how my mind opens up right when I have to run on the treadmill. I’ve finished three chapters rather than run a mile.

I usually end have one outrageous minor character. He or she says the stuff I wish I had said in real life. Readers will love that character.

Writers need to be open to trying new things. My first bestseller was a cookbook, and from that experience I learned things about marketing a book that benefitted me greatly.

But I can't force everything into the arrangement I'd like. I can't use denial to make everything simple.

Gammy used to say "Too much scrubbing takes the life right out of things."

Love always looks nice. I don't really know anyone who doesn't enjoy it when they see it. Anyone who doesn't, I don't really want to know them.

I am a Ford, not a Lincoln.

After all, why be good? How many will actually believe it of us?

The best part of being on the platform that we are is being able to influence and affect so many people.

It is dangerous, at any time, to multiply sources of weakness.

If, at any time, it comes into my head, that a present is due from me to somebody, I am puzzled what to give, until the opportunity is gone.

Excise: A hateful tax levied upon commodities, and adjudged not by the common judges of property, but wretches hired by those to whom excise is paid.

Whenever you see a board up with "Trespassers will be prosecuted," trespass at once.