There are writers who draw immediate attention to the fact that it's fiction. And I like some of that, but it doesn't really have the power.

Don't write about a character. Become that character, and then write your story.

Nothing is as important as a likable narrator. Nothing holds a story together better.

You can tell within a sentence if something is fiction or non-fiction. You can tell in the artifice of the language or the care of the construction the difference between art and life.

Art is so personal. I'm very comforted by the fact that certain movies that I love, other people hate. Certain books that I love, other people hate. You can't please everybody.

To have too much time is not good, you have to force yourself. And human beings aren't meant for true freedom. I've learned that, having had it.

Writing a book is like an unknown abyss, every time. Every book is different. Contrary to what unpublished writers think, it's horrible to have a book out.

If you write a page a day in couple months you have a good chunk of the book and then after a year you have almost a book. It's not that...hard.

I think fiction is about small ambition, small failed ambition.

I've written five books, a book every three years. I'm fairly lazy and it doesn't take that much...people who are not lazy are Isaac Asimov.

You're never so alive as after you thought you were going to die.

And was it his destined part / Only one moment in his life / To be close to your heart?

Go. Think. Turn black into white.Night into day. I am tired of thinking.I know where it will lead me and I don’tWant to be there.Go love. Do your thinking.

Being at a loss to resolve these questions, I am resolved to leave them without any resolution.

Religion is a cow. It gives milk, but it also kicks.

Working from photos makes you a little more analytical, a little more cerebral, because you're less connected to the intensity of life.

I get to meet people from all walks of life, from all different countries, from different backgrounds.

People's view of cancer will change when they have their own relationship with cancer, which everyone will, at some point.

Many things are better for silence than for speech: others are better for speech than for stationery.

Be not the slave of your own past.

Some people are born with the first word of a language resting on their tongue though it may take some time before they can taste it.