The fingers on his flesh told him he was loved, that he had always been loved, and that the world was a place where above all else things that were good would find a way to burrow into you.

If you don't allow yourself the possibility of writing something very, very bad, it would be hard to write something very good.

A weapon does not decide whether or not to kill. A weapon is a manifestation of a decision that has already been made.

It's a rare gift to understand that your life is wondrous, and that it won't last forever.

You don't choose what to believe. Belief chooses you.

I will not live in a city where dead bodies lie abandoned in the streets, and you will not tell the world I do.

... life is a series of tiny, unavoidable decisions.

The choices she's made have left her without choice.

A bullet leaves evidence that a mortar doesn't.

TRUST that if they strayed from your path – they DO NOT belong there. Not everybody can go where you’re going.

What's wisdom if not the will to learn the lessons, which Nature puts in one's way at every step?

My favorite people are the ones that can make any unfunny joke hilarious by just laughing.

Don't expect to build up the weak by pulling down the strong.

There are going to be moments of deep, deep doubts, and you have to have faith that your initial idea was good and just muddle through.

As a rule, people are afraid of truth. Each truth we discover in nature or social life, destroys the crutches on which we need to lean.

Lothaire:Hate scars. I'm physically flawless--why can't everyone be? Everywhere Lothaire went, people stopped and stared. Of course, then they usually ran.

I try not to look back. I'm looking forward. I'm worried more about what I'm going to do next week than I am what I did last week. There are too many things to do. Looking back is for everybody else.

Starting a new novel is a little like starting a new relationship - you have to be prepared to commit for at least three years and put up with the domestic tedium as well as the emotional highs!

We learned some bad things, and the Vietnam War led to some bad conclusions. We're not the greatest generation, that's for sure.