“Like a blinking cursor on an empty page, it was just the first thing. The beginning of the beginning. But at least it was done.”

“Beginning a novel is always hard. It feels like going nowhere. I always have to write at least 100 pages that go into the trashcan before it finally begins to work. It's discouraging, but necessary to write those pages. I try to consider them pages -100 to zero of the novel.”

“No, this is not the beginning of a new chapter in my life; this is the beginning of a new book! That first book is already closed, ended, and tossed into the seas; this new book is newly opened, has just begun! Look, it is the first page! And it is a beautiful one!”

“We read five words on the first page of a really good novel and we begin to forget that we are reading printed words on a page; we begin to see images.”

“Stories never really end...even if the books like to pretend they do. Stories always go on. They don't end on the last page, any more than they begin on the first page.”

“All obedience begins in the affections, and nothing in religion is done right, that is not done there first.”