You build a character, a shell, and if you build it right, something comes to live inside it.

There is a love of wood, as of other things that do not answer to our touch.

I wanted to have very strong female characters. I just thought it was always the way the world should be.

It sounds creepy, but I always liked the idea of disappearing then becoming something new. That of course was before I disappeared.

The irruption of the supernatural into our world is a much more enticing notion to explore than the same thing happening in some past time, or in a wholly imaginary world.

[Poetry] was a form of incantation, a means of welding the world inside his head to the one that surrounded him, words the fiery chain that bound it all together.

If the retreat house was a trap, it was a very nice one.

No one understands now. Those who couldhear a song this deeply vanished long ago.

In my neighborhood, everyone had an opinion on the local cantor. You didn't go to a synagogue to listen to the rabbi's sermon. You went to listen to the cantor. It was like a concert.

I knew the way lost hopes could be dangerous, how they could turn a person into someone they never thought they'd be.

The thing about the 'Melrose' novels is that I have to feel they're impossible when I set out.

The self is fundamentally an illusion arising as a reflection of the soul in matter, much as a clear lake at midnight reflects the moon.

It’s quite a discipline when we’re in trouble to think of God and say, “I need some help.”

These White House scandals are not going away anytime soon. People in Kenya are now saying he's 100 percent American. That's how bad it's gotten.

The world is slowly evolving into a place where the things that we have seen as being taboo are starting to open up a bit more.

The trouble with selfish motives is that they harden into principles, and you end up sending your kids to war for them.

Spring was coming back with the old promise, demanding the old sacrifice.