As a child, my mother told me lots of fairy stories, many her own invention. She, too, tended to reverse the norm.

Writing is writing, and stories are stories. Perhaps the only true genres are fiction and nonfiction. And even there, who can be sure?

The bitterness of joy lies in the knowledge that is cannot last. Nor should joy last beyond a certain season, for, after that season, even joy would become merely habit.

She looked, and a scarlet butterfly flew away from her, away down the length of the tower, and then another, another, an unraveling scarf of butterflies like winged blood.

Archetypes are universal, and, in subtle or extravagant ways, interchangeable.

We need the expressive arts, the ancient scribes, the storytellers, the priests.

The soul is a magician. Only living flesh hampers it.

When I am fascinated by something, I like to play with it.

I submitted manuscripts to publishers. This was not so much a feeling that I should be published as a wish to escape the feared and hated drudgery of normal work.

No one is ever ordinary.

Maidens who stay maidens turn into saints. Old women become sorceresses. Tough jobs, both of these.

Our love was a two-person game. At least until one of us died, and the other became a murderer.

We can only bear the fruit of patience when we have something to be patient about.

Winter is not a season in the North Middlewest

The image I gravitate towards are spunky women, women who talk back.

The wooden wall alone should remain unconquered.

Teachers today can't take to a child.

I feel like directing is an innate talent.

God is not in Kaaba or in Kashi. He is within everyone of us.

It was never supposed to be a hit. It was supposed to be a Joe Morello drum solo.

I think a lot about control nowadays, and I really want to let go and just be more in the moment.