Sometimes the only way to fix a mistake- is to make it twice.
Love is a luxury. It’s something that people are allowed to indulge in when they’re not simply trying to survive and keep other people alive.
I believe we’re brutes, but then, miraculously, there are those among us who stand up against that brutishness and remind us of the goodness we’re capable of.
I’m a woman, but I’ve been a sexist, too.
I write across genres so I see them, more often, as complementary instead of separated by boundaries.
I’m a writer of faith. I was raised Catholic, and I have a deeply Catholic imagination.
Don’t shame the young for releasing their pent-up fear.
As a writer, my main objective is to tell the story urgently – as if whispering it into one ear – and to know the characters intimately.
I’ve left the Church – for many reasons that I’ve written about publicly – but it’s still a large part of my identity, and I still have my faith, if not my Church.
It’s not that I bounce ideas off of my children as much as it is that having children has had a profound effect on the way I see the world. They have mined my soul. They’ve made me a better person and therefore a more empathetic writer.
Red Sox fans have been pushed to the brink over the years, but that’s how faith grows stronger.
If I’d learned nothing else, it was this: If you want to be a great writer, be a man. If you can’t be a man, write like one.
I try not to divide plot and character. I get to know a character by what they want and fear and how those internal forces play out in their lives.
Writing stories is the habit of lying put to good use.
People know the difference between good and evil in their hearts-if they search them. Religions twist good and evil. Their differences are the kind that need to be taught because they aren’t natural.
Omission is a sin only if, in the process of deceiving, you forget the truth. Lying is a sin only if, in the process, the lie becomes the only truth.
The intricacy of plotting a thriller is akin to writing formal poetry.
If you look at the world one way, it takes from you – it’s a thief of time, energy, creative mojo. But if you look at the world another way, it gives you an endless supply of motivation.
Try to think of writing as a gift – more complexly put: it is the curse and the cure.
Writers are socially observant. We find people endlessly fascinating, and real life is mysterious. Sometimes it’s hard to stop staring at the strut and squawk of my fellow man. They can be quite inspiring. Sometimes it’s hard to stop talking to them to see what in the world they’re thinking.