I sometimes wonder what would have happened if the first book had not sold... doesn't bear thinking about, but I suppose we'd have made it work somehow.

Pride makes a man, it drives him, it is the shield wall around his reputation... Men die, they said, but reputation does not die.

Wyrd bith ful araed (Fate is inexorable).

You won't regret the men you never killed, but you will regret the women you passed up.

We all suffer from dreams

Writing is a solitary occupation.

Every day is ordinary, until it isn't.

Of course some days are easier than others, but my worst day is better than being in most humdrum occupations.

Book tours and research provide a lot of travel - too much, I sometimes think, but we do take vacations.

The existence of tricks does not imply the absence of magic.

We make children and wealth and amass land and build halls and assemble armies and give great feasts, but only one thing survives us. Reputation.

Wisdom of the Ages: "Forgiveness" Steroids for the Soul.

The word genius was whispered into my ear the first things I ever Heard while I was still mewling in my crib, laughs Orson (Welles), so it never occured to me that I wasn't until middle age

Taking photographs can assuage the itch for possession sparked by the beauty of a place; our anxiety over losing a precious scene can decline with every click of the shutter.

I smoke pot when I work. I take a couple of tokes before I start. It just loosens you up.

I have an intimate relationship with books. After all, I take them with me into the bathtub-not an invitation I offer lightly.

To me, at forty-four years old, my book was a search for truth and identity.

If you don’t want your life to be 'messed up', don’t fool around with those who have messed up theirs.

Our true nature is like a precious jewel: although it may be temporarily buried in mud, it remains completely brilliant and unaffected. We simply have to uncover it.

One cannot completely avoid this landmark character with large buildings such as these. But the city itself is also gigantic.

That more than 90 per cent of the Indian population should continue to be illiterate even after 175 years of British rule in this country is an intolerable situation which calls for immediate action.