The simplest tool of the writer is repetition. . . . The simplest tool of the writer is repetition.

Storytelling is the art of unfolding knowledge in a way that makes each piece contribute to a larger truth.

Voice really depends on the answer to the question, Who is telling this story? . . . That will color your diction-and determine your metaphors, your sensibility.

You have to roll up your sleeves and be a stonecutter before you can become a sculptor - command of craft always precedes art: apprentice, journeyman, master.

You will not read voice on the page; you will hear it in your head.

It's not enough simply to record the way people actually talk. The dialogue must be concentrated, shaped, dramatically moving, in a way that real-life conversation seldom is.

We create an interior 'movie' in the reader's head through words on the page.

For the big stuff to work credibly, you've got to get the little stuff absolutely right.

The only way to write a novel is to proceed as if you had all the time in the world.

It takes some strength to fight. It takes greater strength to choose not to fight.

Helloooo? I just made some changes in my life, and if I don't get back to you as soon as possible, then guess what? You were one of those changes.

Future never desires to become a past.

How quickly the dead faded into each other,

Painting dissolves the forms at its command ... it melts them into color.

Yes. Yes, when we live our life like 1950s detective films. I often go to my fridge, "Hullo, we're out of milk. I say mother, where's the milk?"

The picture itself is a document. How do you mean? We're looking at a document. It gives you clues.

Really it's hard to know where the Republican Party ends and the Tea Party begins.

Few things are as psychologically brutal as chess.

They remember me as this shy girl sitting under the table. But they obviously didn't know what was going on in my head.

When the most important decisions are made in secret, we lose our ability to check the powers that control.