“If I ask you to think about something, you can decide not to. But if I make you feel something? Now I have your attention.”

“Each thing you add to your story is a drop of paint falling into clear water; it spreads through and colors everything.”

“You cherry-pick events that are relevant to the story question and construct a gauntlet of challenge (read: the plot) that will force the protagonist to put his money where his mouth is. Think baptism by ever-escalating fire.”

“Stories not only give us a much needed practice on figuring out what makes people tick, they give us insight into how we tick.”

“Was it hard?” I ask.“Letting go?”“Not as hard as holding on to something thatwasn’t real.”I gulp. “Can I ask how you did it?”“I just decided, Ava.That’s all.I just decided.”

“Before there were books, we read each other.”

“I'm beginning to see that there's a difference between art that trusts beauty's simple power to point people to God and Christian art that's consciously propagandistic. My Uncle Kenny, with whom I spent most of my time in Italy, said something profound--that you can make art about the Light, or you can make art that shows what the Light reveals about the world.”