Without a doubt my mother was an inspiration for my writing. This is true in many ways, but mostly because she is a wonderful storyteller, without even knowing it.

I suspect the most we can hope for, and it's no small hope, is that we never give up, that we never stop giving ourselves permission to try to love and receive love.

Traits don't change, states of mind do.

I actually see myself in all my characters. In order to imagine what it feels like to be another person I have to use my own experiences and responses to the world.

The facts didn't matter. Their stories mattered, and each of their stories belonged to each of them alone.

Had they known at these moments to be quietly joyful? Most likely not. People mostly did not know enough when they were living life that they were living it.

You surely know that in the course of a long marriage it is not unusual for a husband or a wife to develop a crush on someone else.

I'm so interested in the fact that we really don't know anybody. We think we know the people close to us, but we don't, we really don't.

In a way, I'm very interested in writing about Maine, because I think Maine represents its own kind of history. It's the oldest state, and it's the whitest state.

People like to think the younger generation's job is to steer the world to hell. But it's never true, is it? They're hopeful and good - and that's how it should be.

Or maybe, he thought, returning to the boxes, it was part of being Catholic--you were made to feel guilty about everything

Dignity, and even holiness too, sometimes, are more questions of coat and waistcoat than some people imagine.

He lost himself in the words and images conjured in his mind and for a while forgot ... He found himself flying among stars and planets ...

Anyone know how can erase mind memory?

You cut life to pieces with your epigrams.

Fear doesn't exist anywhere except in the mind.

Curiosity in children is but an appetite for knowledge.

I think sensuality is a part of me. It's not all of me, but it's a part of who I am.

Women had no clerical role anywhere in the Western world, period.

Economy without ecology means managing the human nature relationship without knowing the delicate balance between humankind and the natural world

If anybody ever dares to compare Bob Dole to Clinton, then they're comparing a criminal to an honest man.