How quickly a person in pain whom you can't help becomes a reproach. And then, no doubt, a thorn.

Well. I don't suppose you have to believe in ghosts to know that we are all haunted, all of us, by things we can see and feel and guess at, and many more things that we can't.

I became a writer because I love to read, yet I never get to unless I'm reviewing a book or doing research.

If you're going to spend two or three years immersed in a subject, you better be deeply interested in it, or it won't be interesting to the reader.

I love smart commercial fiction. Susan Isaacs, for example and the readers who interest me are, in the preponderance, women. I am one of them; I like the books they like.

I'm very interested, in all my books, in community, what binds people together, which I think is an obvious consequence of being the fourth of six children.

The family wage has been eroded by the same developments that have promoted consumerism as a way of life.

I grew up before there were strict leash laws.

Everyone wants to be tested and challenged. Everyone would like a good, honest fight to exhaust their frustrations.

Umpires are like emotional girlfriends, once they make up their minds, there is no point in arguing

A lot of people don't know this, but when 'Dancing with the Stars' first asked me to be on the show, I said no, because I wanted to act and to be taken seriously.

I miss being able to wake up when I want and go on stage when I want and pull down my pants when I want.

Savvy observers occasionally note television's resemblance to the weather: Everybody loves to complain about it, but nobody can do anything to fix it.

Forty percent of my ideas came from my wife.

Terrific! A successful blend of genres, complex and fascinating characters, and loads of suspense make 24 Bones a must-read.

In brainwashing and the eliciting of confessions, the physiological importance of inducing a sense of guilt and conflict can hardly be over emphasized.