Literature isn't a moral beauty contest. Its power arises from the authority and audacity with which the impersonation is pulled off; the belief it inspires is what counts.

The road to hell is paved with works-in-progress.

I cannot and do not live in the world of discretion, not as a writer, anyway. I would prefer to, I assure you - it would make life easier. But discretion is, unfortunately, not for novelists.

He had learned the worst lesson that life can teach - that it makes no sense.

You can no more make someone tell the truth than you can force someone to love you.

Old age isn't a battle; old age is a massacre.

The horror of being caged has lost its thrill.

Everybody else is working to change, persuade, tempt and control them. The best readers come to fiction to be free of all that noise.

I have a slogan I use when I get anxious writing, which happens quite a bit: ‘the ordeal is part of the commitment.’ It’s one of my mantras. It makes a lot of things doable.

When the whole world doesn't believe in God, it'll be a great place.

Because that is when you love somebody - when you see them being game in the face of the worst. Not courageous. Not heroic. Just game.

A woman should be like water, able to flow over and around anything.

Getting some redecorating ideas?’ Nico asked. ‘Maybe you could do your dining room in mediaeval monk skulls.’ Hades arched an eyebrow. ‘I can never tell when you’re joking.

Food brings people together on many different levels. It's nourishment of the soul and body it's truly love.

Books are sepulchres of thought.

You learned people and artists have, no doubt, all sorts of superior things in your heads; but you're human beings like the rest of us, and we, too, have our dreams and fancies.

Every cocke is proud on his owne dunghill.

I bought a seven-dollar pen because I always lose pens and I got sick of not caring.

Real racist jokes or sexist jokes aren't funny - not because they're offensive, but because they're not true. As soon as a joke is based on an untruth, it's not funny.

Anger, ego, jealousy are the biggest diseases,Keep yourself aloof from these three diseases.

My parents got divorced and military school gave me a structure. A lot of kids my age were children of divorced parents. They didn't know what to do with the kids.