Breakfast was only worth having when somebody else made it for you.

I decided to write short stories because they got rejected quicker.

People think they own time. They have watches and clocks and digital pulses. But they are wrong. Time owns them.

People nearly always believe, and are willing to back it up with weapons and cruelty, that their religion and way of life is better than the other person's

I approach serious subjects, and I like to have the good guys win and have the parents among the good guys

If you write a story based on a real person, you're trapped by the details of the real person and his life. It gets in the way of writing your own story.

I love writing and do not know why it is considered such a difficult, agonizing profession.

My favorite book is always the one I'm working on at the moment

I wrote eight full-length adult novels in my twenties. None of them were published

Actually my first eight books were historical novels, but they were never published

in Los Angeles ... was the thinking-est crowd on earth: how to get ahead, how to mold a better body, how to have a better relationship, how to score, earn, fight, win, get published, be a star.

I do not like to repeat successes I like to go on to other things.

I will age for you, if it pleases you. I will match you, wrinkle for wrinkle, grey hair for grey hair, crease for crease, wrinkle for wrinkle. You will be so beautiful when you are old.

Secrets. Need to disguise. The novel was born of this.

Whatever you do, don't do it halfway.

The processing capacity of the conscious mind has been estimated at 120 bits per second.

I try and stay out of the sun for the most part. I wear a hat. I play golf. And I wear a hat. But I've had no problem - no major problem - but certainly no problem with skin.

I wrote about four novels before I wrote a word of journalism.

there should be a place for everything, and everything in its place.

I can honestly say I've never sold any arms to a repressive foreign regime while reassuring everyone at home that the weapons will be used for nice things.

I find trying to solve problems and save lives is far more important than my film career.