I like writing about big turning points, where professional and personal lives coalesce, where the boundaries are coming down, and you're faced with a set of choices which will change life forever.

Some people are little Chernobyls, shimmering with silent, spreading poison: get anywhere near them and every breath you take will wreck you from the inside out.

I wanted to tell her that being loved is a talent too, that it takes as much guts and as much work as loving; that some people, for whatever reason, never learn the knack

Her forehead was a maze of anxious little grooves, from a lifetime of wondering about whether everyone within range was OK.

A bore or an uggo might manage not to get up anyone's nose, but if a girl's got brains and looks and personality, she's going to piss someone off, somewhere along the way.

Don't you ever feel that - that you just need to get away? From everything? That it's all too much?

I hate nostalgia, it's laziness with prettier accessories.

We think about mortality so little, these days, except to flail hysterically at it with trendy forms of exercise and high-fiber cereals and nicotine patches.

The thing about being a mystery writer, what marks a mystery writer out from a chick lit author or historical fiction writer, is that you always find a mystery in every situation.

I don't do that kind of negativity. If you put your energy into thinking about how much the fall would hurt, you're already halfway down.

I had been right: freedom smelled like ozone and thunderstorms and gunpowder all at once, like snow and bonfires and cut grass, it tasted like seawater and oranges.

It's a strange grief… to die of nostalgia for something you you will never live.

Tune in to the intuitive messages emanating from your heart. They are the essence of who you are and who you wish to become.

I am thankful I was born in America, although if I gain any more weight the burqa thing may start to seem like a good idea to me. See? Another plus about America, you can always find some food.

If you have small-government, traditional values, you may be considered by your own leadership to be an enemy of the state.

The future seems to be in good hands, it's the past I'm worried about.

My parents let me find my way and that's how they supported me the entire way.

Designers don't actually solve problems. They work through them.

Character is ethics in action.

I was really excited to have the opportunity to make Fiddler.

If I brought groceries the way I buy health insurance, I'd eat a lot better - and so would my dog.