Writing my first book, I think in hindsight I went into it saying, 'It's gonna sell.' I was earning enough to scrape by sometime around a book or two before 'Tell No One.' I moved up from $50,000 to $75,000, then $150,000 for each book. I had never t...
When I was growing up, I was teased for being too skinny. I went to summer camp when I was 11. I wore shorts, and the nurse said to me, in front of all my friends, that I was anorexic and that she had to monitor me to make sure I was eating. Because ...
I don't wish I started later, but I was never a child star. I was in school every year and had normal friends and I loved it and here I am, so I can't say that I wish I hadn't done it. I used to say, 'No, I didn't miss any of my childhood,' but it is...
I'm naturally shy, so the social media thing is new to me. I haven't really figured out how my voice sounds on social media, you know? I don't want to tweet everyday just for the sake of tweeting. I want to make sure whatever I do there is honest. So...
No, the state is anything but the result of a contract! No one with even just an ounce of common sense would agree to such a contract. I have a lot of contracts in my files, but nowhere is there one like this. The state is the result of aggressive fo...
The Lone Star of Africa Land of the free, on your beach and sacred forests loves flourished. You, Liberia, you my love to echo, the scream of freedom, holding tight and will never let go. O beautiful land, The Lone star for decades has survived wars ...
I realized I had a novel on my hands, but didn't know where it was going to go. So I thought, 'I'm going to do everything that you're not supposed to do when you plan a novel; I'm going to step back and let this thing take itself wherever it wants to...
Ordinarily my mom just sunk deeper into her corner of the couch and ignored it. She had succesfully ignored a quarter of a century of entropy and decay, had sat peacefully crunching popcorn and drinking soda while the house fell down around us. If I ...
Now all my tales are based on the fundemental premise that common human laws and interests and emotions have no validity or significance in the vast cosmos-at-large.... To achieve the essence of real externality, whether of time or space or dimension...
I have this set-up at my house where I have one big movie theater screen that's 9 ft. by 16 ft. Then, I have nine 63-inch monitors around it; four on either side and one underneath. So I get all nine one o'clock games, and I can switch them onto the ...
I've been trying to write a book since before I was old enough to vote, and I've collected many rejection slips from publishers and magazines. I used to keep them all stuck to my refrigerator, with magnets, but an ex-girlfriend told me they were depr...
Before I had kids, I always found it funny how people would talk about their children like they were the cutest things on the planet and how every little thing they did was endlessly fascinating. Now that I've had kids, I can say with certainty that,...
...I don't ever want to feel that way. Feel as if there are no surprises left. The surprises make life worth living. Expecting nothing, accepting it all. Accepting isn't the right word. ACKNOWLEDGING it all. I suppose I'll just try to figure it out a...
I'm drawn to write about upstate New York in the way in which a dreamer might have recurring dreams. My childhood and girlhood were spent in upstate New York, in the country north of Buffalo and West of Rochester. So this part of New York state is ve...
I didn't care for most of the books I was being asked to read in school. I started reading like crazy right after high school when I got a job in a mental hospital. I was working my way through college, and I did a lot of night shifts, and there was ...
Let me tell you a story about when I was growing up in Spain. Many Sundays, we would invite 30, 40, 50 people to the countryside, and my father would make a big paella. He put me in charge of the fire and the 'stove' - the rocks that hold the pan. Bu...
Yeah, and so Max and Dylan are supposed to, like, go to Germany and have kids together," I heard Gazzy say. My eyes popped open and I bolted upright. "What?" Fang said, his voice icy. "Gazzy!" I yelled. Wide blue eyes looked at me in surprise, then b...
You don't have to say I love you to say I love you," you said with a shrug. "All you have to do is say my name and I know." ..."Can't you hear it?" you said. "When you love someone, you say their name different. Like it's safe inside your mouth.
Stupid English." "English isn't stupid," I say. "Well, my English teacher is." He makes a face. "Mr. Franklin assigned an essay about our favorite subject, and I wanted to write about lunch, but he won't let me." "Why not?" "He says lunch isn't a sub...
Have I ever pretended to be something? I think back in college I think I might have told a girl that I was a professional tennis player once. And then, of course, she had never heard of me so I had to dig deeper. 'I'm just sort of on the playing sate...
I've had jokes stolen a thousand times. But if you can do it better than me, you can have it. I've had jokes stolen from me in the club when I'm next on stage. And my brain will start to turn, and the gears will start turning, and I'll go onstage and...
