The semi-colon is a burp, a hiccup. It's a drunk staggering out of the saloon at 2 a.m., grabbing your lapels on the way and asking you to listen to one more story.

In fact, one could argue that the skill of the fiction writer boils down to the ability to exploit intensity.

Structure is translation software for your imagination.

Every hour you spend writing is an hour you don't spend worrying about your writing.

Status, worry and comparison are ways to madness, not victory.

Superb historical romance, with a spiritual theme woven seamlessly throughout. I much enjoyed The Covered Deep and look forward to more from its author!

Think of it as the Doorway of No Return. The feeling must be that your lead character, once she passes through, cannot go home again until the major problem of the plot is solved.

Write like you're in love. Edit like you're in charge.

A writing teacher once told me that the most successful movies and books were simple plots about complex characters. You should be able to articulate your concept in a couple of lines.

There's a perilous word fiction writers need to watch out for. The word is 'had.'

The thing I do at the beginning is a "voice journal," a free form doc that is the character speaking to me. I just work on it until I start to hear different from my own, or the other characters.

People want to spend time together and I just couldn't pretend that I wanted to do that. But now I do get it. [..] Though I still don’t do that.

Life crumples me like paper, Tight, smashed, discarded. But crumpled paper soon unfolds, Opening slowly, sharing what was once hidden inside, Allowing my story to be revealed.

We can either change the complexities of life ... or develop ways that enable us to cope more effectively.

So many people have so many problems. When you think that health is wealth, you're so grateful just to be normal, more or less. Aren't you?

Zero of Animal Life probably about 300 fathoms.

Whoever has loved once, knows all that life contains of sorrow and of joy.

I love you. I love your smile, your snarl, your grin, your face when you're sleeping.

The very effort to forget teaches us to remember.

...but I've never regretted it. You can't regret experience.

Many person might have achieved wisdom had they not supposed that they already possessed it.