There are so many ways to go wrong. All we've got are metaphors, and they're never exactly right. You can never just Say. The. Thing.

I was a stepchild in two different families. The hardest thing about being a stepchild is you know that in some way everything would be easier if you didnt exist.

If I had a view like this to look down on every day, I would have the energy and inspiration to conquer the world. The trouble is, when you most need such a view, no one gives it to you.

Read at the level at which you want to write. Reading is the nourishment that feeds the kind of writing you want to do.

Goon Squad' took about three years to write and that's the short end. My second novel, 'Look at Me,' took six years.

I don’t want to fade away, I want to flame away - I want my death to be an attraction, a spectacle, a mystery. A work of art.

Because you can't write habitually and well all the time, you have to be willing to write badly. That's how you get the regularity that enables you to be present for the good stuff.

Reading is the nourishment that lets you do interesting work.

I'm always happy," Sasha said. "Sometimes I just forget.

The answers were maddeningly absent—it was like trying to remember a song that you knew made you feel a certain way, without a title, artist, or even a few bars to bring it back.

Vinegar: that's what fear smells like.

The bent head, the averted eye, the faltering voice, the wincing figure- these, and not the unshrinking gaze and frank reply, are the true signals of passion.

The only limit to your impact is your imagination and commitment.

We need policies for long-term security that are designed by women, focused on women, executed by women not at the expense of men, or instead of men, but alongside and with men.

I don't say that I never feel fear before a performance, but I have learned to channel it.

Don't let a mad world tell you that success is anything other than a successful present moment.

I resisted parenthood for a long, long time. But having a daughter has given me a sense of hopefulness that I didn't have before.

Most art students are generous till it comes to squeezing their colour on the palette... Many pictures haven't become works of art simply because the artist tried to save a nickel's worth of colour.

When it comes to 'Glee,' I feel like I've been in a relationship, and now I can mingle a bit.

God is within you. God is a nice feeling. He's the flowers and smells and the nice things in life.

If you refuse to change your job (if you don't like it), the only sensible thing you can do is practice loving it every day.