The rest of it - and perhaps the best of it - is a permission slip: you can, you should, and if you're brave enough to start, you will.

you can, you should, and if you’re brave enough to start, you will.

The road to hell is paved with adverbs.

When you write a book, you spend day after day scanning and identifying the trees. When you’re done, you have to step back and look at the forest.

Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.

Description begins in the writer’s imagination, but should finish in the reader’s.

Write with the door closed, rewrite with the door open.

The most important things to remember about back story are that (a) everyone has a history and (b) most of it isn’t very interesting.

Symbolism exists to adorn and enrich, not to create an artificial sense of profundity.

The more you read, the less apt you are to make a fool of yourself with your pen or word processor.

To write is human, to edit is divine.

Anger is an indication of pain and pain is an indication of sadness that grows inward and creates a lot of discomfort.

Every day brings a chance for you to draw in a breath, kick off your shoes, and dance.

Middle age is the time when a man is always thinking that in a week or two he will feel as good as ever.

He used to say we all had a compass inside of us and what we needed to do was to find it and to follow it.

Most gentlemen don't like love, they just like to kick it around.

One must love humanity in order to reach out into the unique essence of each individual: no one can be too low or too ugly.

The Holy Spirit will lead you to be with people as Jesus would be with them if He were in your place.

The future of narrative? Built in, part of the human template. Not going away.

We will be a consultative, collegial government. No surprises, no excuses. That's what you'll get under the Coalition.

I wish I did believe in God. It would be a great relief to think, 'God'll take care of it. God'll put gas in the car tomorrow'.