“Character is destiny. For the cronic do-gooder, the happy-go-lucky sociopath, the dysfunctional family, under the gun everyone diverts to who they are. We may hunger to map out a new course, but for most of us, the lines have been drawn since we were 5.”

“An author needs a lot more than one person to succumb to his literary seductive charms, but, like Saul, he must realize that he doesn't have to--and indeed cannot--capture the hearts of every possible reader out there. No matter who the writer, his ideal intended audience is only a small faction of all the living readers. Name the most widely read authors you can think of--from Shakespeare, Austen, and Dickens to Robert Waller, Stephen King, and J.K. Rowling--and the immense majority of book-buyers out there actively decline to read them.”

“If our impulses were confined to hunger, thirst, and desire, we might be nearly free; but now we are moved by every wind that blows and a chance word or scene that that word may convey to us.”

“Readers tend to tolerate such "accidents"... when they get the characters into trouble but they're less accepting when the author uses them to rescue people. The "deus ex machina"...in one stroke it renders meaningless all the efforts of the cast.”

“A dysfunctional family is any family with more than one person in it.”

“[I]f we revert to history, we shall find that the women who have distinguished themselves have neither been the most beautiful nor the most gentle of their sex.”

“All monsters are queers. Who is able to bring the dead back to life? God and the Devil. The Devil makes dead men into monsters: immortal, immoral—and queer.”