“I never plan. I never know what the next page is going to be..... But that’s the fun of writing a novel or a story, because I don’t know what’s going to happen next.”

“Writing is always a process of discovery - I never know the end,or even the events on the next page, until they happen. There is a constant interplay between the imagining and shaping of the story.”

“The most interesting thing about writing is the way that it obliterates time. Three hours seem like three minutes. Then there is the business of surprise. I never know what is coming next. The phrase that sounds in the head changes when it appears on the page. Then I start probing it with a pen, finding new meanings. Sometimes I burst out laughing at what is happening as I twist and turn sentences. Strange business, all in all. One never gets to the end of it. That’s why I go on, I suppose. To see what the next sentences I write will be.”

“Never give up. No one knows what's going to happen next.”

“You never really knew for sure what was going to happen next in life, Duncan thought. That was part of the pain and the fun. You never really knew the end of the story until it happened.”

“You're never confident. You go in fear and trembling every day. It would be awfully nice to think that you know how to write a novel. But what you know is the novel you just wrote. You don't have the slightest notion how to write the one you're going to do next.”