I try to let go of the intellect and just tell the story. I only read the page I have in front of me on the screen. Then when the whole story is told, I print it, wait a week and read it.
The first lie of fiction is that the author gives some order to the chaos of life: chronological order, or whatever order the author chooses.
I was a lousy journalist. I could never be objective. Sometimes I invented the whole story.
I’m interested in people who have to overcome obstacles, people who are not sheltered by the umbrella of the establishment, marginals.
I tend to see the similarities in people and not the differences.
I’m living in California but I have a place that is mine in Chile and I belong there. I am no longer an exile.
I’ve been a story-teller all my life but I realized it only recently.
My life is about ups and downs, great joys and great losses.
I have travelled all over the world and one thing that amazes me is that I can communicate with people. My story may be different but emotionally we are all the same.
We want a world where life is preserved, and the quality of life is enriched for everybody, not only for the privileged.
Conceit is a privilege of the ignorant; the wise man is humble because he knows how little he knows.
Youth is not a period in life but a state of mind.
You have the health you deserve.
There is no light without shadow, just as there is no happiness without pain.
Love is a free contract that begins with a spark and can end the same way.
Eros is very close to death. And both things, in a way, balance each other.
Happiness is pure kitch; we come into the world to suffer and learn.
Literary characters, like my grandmother’s apparitions, are fragile beings, easily frightened; they must be treated with care so they will feel comfortable in my pages.
There is room in the human heart for all the divinities.
Everyone in his place and a place for everyone.