
Literature has done great work for feminism - writing and reading are a practice of empathy - and great literature will continue to do so.

To know someone, to be known. That matters more than he'd ever thought it would.

Scars are good. Right, Helmud? It's the body's way of making armour.

Our stories are what we have," Our Good Mother says. "Our stories preserve us. we give them to one another. Our stories have value. Do you understand?

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.

She let him go once. Every day demands that she release him over and over again.

Father can be the person you most hate and most fear, yes, but deep down you expect that he'll be the one to save you.

My work is to know the characters intimately and to tell their story.

Don't talk about dying? You want me to talk about love. They're one and the same, child. One and the same.

Even a poisoned, desolate childhood can be missed.

It was the brightest entry into darkness.

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.

When you're in the world looking for only one thing, you find it or it finds you. The obsession can be mutual

Don't shame the young for releasing their pent-up fear.

The intricacy of plotting a thriller is akin to writing formal poetry.

Genres are just bottles for the various boats. The boats matter to me.

I'm a woman, but I've been a sexist, too.

Writing across genres has made me more prolific. When one is fighting me or simply not cutting it, I turn to another.

Some of the best work done to combat the Republicans has been wit and humor.

Try to think of writing as a gift - more complexly put: it is the curse and the cure.

I don't have a favorite. I need different genres at different times.

Being cross-genre, you can encounter an image and decide not only how to best express it but what form would express it best.

Sometimes your secrets are your only value.

I have faith in human beings. I struggle with that faith.

My oldest sister was an actress living in NYC by the time I was ten, and desperately wanted to be the one in charge of the words.

Sometimes the only way to fix a mistake- is to make it twice.

Will you be my wife forever? Here and now and beyond all of this?

I always doubt people ... I've survived by not believing in other human beings.

People never outgrow wanting to be liked for being who they truly are, especially when they've grown up in the limelight or its shadowy edge.

Beauty, you can find it here if you look hard enough.

The box we stored God i kept getting smaller ... until only a speck of god still exists, maybe only an atom.
Maybe an atom is all we need.

I prefer true over happy now.

The poem has to bear the weight with image, language ... the screenplay with dialogue, plot ...

I've either been in love a dozen times or never. I can't tell.

You learn to exploit genre for the more important things - to my mind - like story, character, image, language.

Each genre has something to teach me about the others. Not all the lessons are transferable, but many of the most important ones are.

You're a hero here.'
'I don't want to be a hero.'
'What do you want?'
'I want to be a leader.

I want to keep looking at ways to stride forward with positivity.

The dirt," he says, his voice strangely peaceful. "What about it?" she asks. "It's dirty.

Now I feel like we weren't made for each other. We're making each other
into the people we should become.

I didn't know it until the end. All stories worth telling are love stories.

Writers aren't born properly labeled so it is hard to know one when one appears.

Memories are like water.

Red Sox fans have been pushed to the brink over the years, but that's how faith grows stronger.

Our stories are what we are. Our stories preserve us. We give them to one another. Our stories have value

For the first time in as long as he can remember, El Capitan is proud of his brother. Damn it, Helmud! Shit! You've been planning to kill me!

I'm about to start something new. I'm waiting to be whelmed. The whelming as you start something new is quite something.

I don't know when I'm writing dark. I don't know when I'm writing funny or even heartbreaking. I'm always just trying to write it true.

Basically if you burst into my office the walls themselves will flutter as if alive - maybe that's the reason for all the wings in 'Pure.'