One of the biggest problems for beginning writers is this need to over-explain.

People make events into stories. Stories give events meaning.

I'm a great believer in gathering together all your obsessions and seeing if you can make a novel out of them.

Routine kills creative thought.

Homeopathy seemed . . . both mathematical and poetic.

What folly takes light through ether to each eye from every horizon.

I wonder if the reason I tend to say yes to everything is because I deeply believe that I can survive anything.

But I quite like the way you can talk about science without necessarily using mathematics, but using metaphors instead.

I think about stories and their logic and wonder if there can be any such thing as simply "there is a book.

In real life nothing means anything. Stuff happens and there just is no structure.

Sometimes you have to trust grownups, perhaps more so when they are not there to actually supervise you.

Kindness is the music that softens every heart and fills it with ineffable joy.

Please understand there is no depression in this house and we are not interested in the possibilities of defeat. They do not exist.

Tyranny and despotism can be exercised by many, more rigorously, more vigorously, and more severely, than by one.

Admire the world for never ending on you -- as you would an opponent, without taking your eyes away from him, or walking away.

I'm fifty-six years old - I'm as old as rock 'n roll.

I share the same advice that my mom gave me - stay hydrated and sleep well. And that being a beautiful person on the inside is what really matters.

Most companies don't want their data co-mingled with other customers. Small companies will tolerate it.

I have a tree man coming to trim the jacaranda in my front garden.

I've never owned a pair of jeans, but I had a fantastic denim boiler-suit and it got a lot of wearing.

When you don't understand something it's always OK to ask questions. That's really the mentality that I've had.