In real life I avoid all parties altogether, but on paper I can mingle with the best of them

Ever consider what pets must think of us? I mean, here we come back from a grocery store with the most amazing haul - chicken, pork, half a cow. They must think we're the greatest hunters on earth!

I read so I can live more than one life in more than one place.

But what I hope for from a book - either one that I write or one that I read - is transparency. I want the story to shine through. I don't want to think of the writer.

It seems to me that since I've had children, I've grown richer and deeper. They may have slowed down my writing for a while, but when I did write, I had more of a self to speak from.

It is not how much you love someone, but who you are when you are with him.

The Amateur Marriage grew out of the reflection that of all the opportunities to show differences in character, surely an unhappy marriage must be the richest.

It is very difficult to live among people you love and hold back from offering them advice.

Once upon a time, there was a woman who discovered she had turned into the wrong person.

People always call it luck when you've acted more sensibly than they have.

The hardest novel to write was Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant.

Art is not about itself but the attention we bring to it.

Understanding life is like trying to put together a puzzle with pieces that don't fit.

Half a league, half a league, Half a league onward, All in the valley of Death Rode the six hundred.

On the days I'm pitching, it's almost a coin flip as to know if the guys behind me are going to be there to play 100%.

The great networks are there to prove that ideas can be canned like spaghetti. If everything ends up by tasting like everything else, is that not the evidence that it has been properly cooked?

Progress and reaction have both turned out to be swindles. Seemingly, there is nothing left but quietism - robbing reality of its terrors by simply submitting to it.

I would love to learn to play something so I don't have to rely on someone to collaborate with.

There are four principles we really taught: to live passionately, love completely, learn humbly and then lead boldly.

Winter sunshine is a fairy wand touching everything with a strange magic. It is like the smile of a friend in time of sorrow.

The value of failure is greatly over-rated. It's a preposterous myth.