There's a joy in writing short stories, a wonderful sense of reward when you pull certain things off.

Time, which is your enemy in almost everything in this life, is your friend in writing.

We are made to persist. that's how we find out who we are.

Fearlessness in those without power is maddening to those who have it.

One of the things that draws writers to writing is that they can get things right that they got wrong in real life by writing about them.

The beauty of a fragment is that it still supports the hope of brilliant completeness.

A piece of writing is a dangerous thing," he said. "It can change your life.

Real maturity is the ability to imagine the humanity of every person as fully as you believe in your own humanity.

Memory is funny. Once you hit a vein the problem is not how to remember but how to control the flow.

Everything has to be pulling weight in a short story for it to be really of the first order.

Most of us dont live lives that lend themselves to novelistic expression, because our lives are so fragmented.

People who are unwilling to talk about deep personal issues do not trust their own emotions.

The smell of cooking food is often a calming one.

It's hard to make a lot of pop culture references where there's no pop culture.

Legend has it that when God created me, he gave me a big distinctive voice, a lot of boldness and no heart.

Does inadequacy not characterize all that we make use of to perceive and describe the world? Are the signs of language not just as inadequate, albeit differently, as are images?

The home is not the one tame place in the world of adventure. It is the one wild place in the world of rules and set tasks.

It is always better to imitate a successful man than to envy him.

Given that we can live only a small part of what there is in us -- what happens with the rest?

I try to be accommodating, but I'm pretty much a loner.

When you have a background in combat sports, people think you're this martial arts expert, but really I'm just a guy who is able to do certain things without making a mess of himself.