There is no remedy for death--or birth--except to hug the spaces in between. Live loud. Live wide. Live tall.

There's solace in the thought that I will never finish missing her.

To ask a novelist to talk about his novels is like asking somebody to cook about their dancing.

These are the stories that we tell ourselves and only ourselves, and they are better left unshared.

...crushed between the fears of going forward and the dread of going back.

Secrets are like pregnancies hereabouts. You can hide them for a while but then they will start screaming.

Try pitching a story of happiness to your editors and their toes are going to curl up.

Retiring from writing is not to retire from life, but retiring from writing is to avoid the inevitable bitterness which a writing career is bound to deliver as its end product, in almost every case.

My father had osteomyelitis-his left arm was withered between his elbow and his shoulder ... . But the amputation of a Stone Age man called Leaf, a stoneworker, does not relate to my father at all.

I felt that, in some ways, my novels lacked heart because of the distance between me and the subject matter. But no one wants to read a book based on good health, a happy upbringing, a long marriage.

Love that is fueled solely by feelings will suddenly find itself out of gas on a long road with no gas stations.

Rage and hurt coalesce into a stone in my chest and as I take another gulp of my father's prized whiskey, I hear myself say, "Tell me about your plan.

You may marry the man of your dreams ladies but fourteen years later you're married to a couch that burps.

Life has never been easy. Nor is it meant to be. It is a matter of being joyous in the face of sorrow.

We believe that electricity exists, because the electric company keeps sending us bills for it, but we cannot figure out how it travels inside wires.

I'm generally pessimistic about the dumbing down of America - especially with summer movies.

I need to know the price of a gallon of milk and a dozen eggs. I need to know right now.

A clean confession combined with a promise never to commit the sin again, when offered before one who has the right to receive it, is the purest type of repentance.

[A]ny desired additional nicotine 'kick' could be easily obtained through pH regulation.

When you sleep I will creep Into your thoughts Like a bad debt That you can't pay Take the easy way and give in!