“Friends may come and go but enemies accumulate.”

“I didn't come in here to argue with a woman with big hair”

“I think I'm going to cry, this is crazy.""No, you're just processing. Go ahead and cry.""I thought men got nervous around crying females.""I'm a Marine, remember? We're trained to handle anything.”

“Later we can go to dinner.”“I suppose that might work,” she said.She sounded so damn casual, he thought. As if the decision she had just made weren’t staggering in its implications. As if it weren’t going to alter destinies and change the fate of nations.”

“I love you, Desdemona.”“I know,” she whispered. “You don’t have to say the words.”He smiled slowly. “Trust me, you’re going to hear them every day for the rest of our lives.”

“The hero in a romance is the most important challenge the heroine must face and conquer. The hero is her real problem in the book, not whatever trendy issue or daring adventure is also going on in the subplot. In some way, shape, or form, in some manner either real or perceived on the heroine's part, the hero must be a source of emotional and, yes, sometimes physical risk. He must present a genuine threat.”

“Believe in yourself and in your own voice, because there will be times in this business when you will be the only one who does. Take heart from the knowledge that an author with a strong voice will often have trouble at the start of his or her career because strong,distinctive voices sometimes make editors nervous. But in the end, only the strong survive.”