It takes me six months to do a story. I think it out and then write it sentence by sentence - no first draft. I can't write five words but that I change seven.

Of course I talk to myself. I like a good speaker, and I appreciate an intelligent audience.

The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue.

The only dependable law of life - everything is always worse than you thought it was going to be.

Creativity is a wild mind and a disciplined eye.

I like to have a martini/Two at the very most/After three I'm under the table/After four I'm under my host.

Time may be a great healer, but it's a lousy beautician.

Men seldom make passes at girls who wear glasses.

If you want to know what God thinks about money, just look at the people He gives it to.

Never throw mud: you can miss the target, but your hands will remain dirty.

Years are only garments, and you either wear them with style all your life, or else you go dowdy to the grave.

The best- choices are positive attitude, positive outlook and positive self-esteem.

Because sure enough, the more you try to eradicate those limiting thoughts from bouncing around in your head, those negative thoughts are going to be bouncing around in your head more and more!

We know where they are. They are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad.

There is no such thing as an ugly language. Today I hear every language as if it were the only one, and when I hear of one that is dying, it overwhelms me as though it were the death of the earth.

To me, freedom means having the power, the inherent right, the capacity and the ability to make choices that honour who I am.

I don't look at this as a religious based thing. To me this is energy based.

You cannot invent an algorithm that is as good at recommending books as a good bookseller.

The Local Paper here asked that me books be banned........THE HIGHEST PRAISE for an Irish writer.

When I was a kid, I loved having a book in my hand. I still do. I wasn't a fast reader, but I was a steady reader. I read all of The Bobbsey Twins, Nancy Drew, and Cherry Ames books.

I'm excited about it, thrilled with the success thus far.