Writers, Unlike Most People, Tell Their Best

Never Say Love Is "like" Anything... It Isn't.

The Thing That Strikes Me Now When I Think About The Wilderness Of Childhood Is The Incredible Degree Of Freedom My Parents Gave Me To Adventure There. A Very Grave, Very Significant Shift In Our Idea Of Childhood Has Occurred Since Then. The Wilderness Of Childhood Is Gone; The Days Of Adventure Are Past. The Land Ruled By Children, To Which A Kid Might Exile Himself For At Least Some Portion Of Every Day From The Neighboring Kingdom Of Adulthood, Has In Large Part Been Taken Over, Co-opted, Colonized, And Finally Absorbed By The Neighbors.

The Problems You Have As A Novelist Tend To Have To Do With Making A Living And Trying To Find Ways To Supplement The Income You Get From Writing Novels. For A Lot Of Writers, That Involves Teaching. In My Case, So Far, I've Been Able To Get By Working In Hollywood With This Tv Stuff I've Been Doing. And It's Very Important, Because My Wife Is A Writer, Too, And We Don't Have Health Insurance Through Any Employer.

I'm Never Going To Be A Tom Clancy. And I Wouldn't Really Want To Be - Not That I Have Anything Against Him, And I Wish Him Continued Success - Because That's Not Why I'm Writing Novels. I'm Doing It Because I Have To. I Feel Like I Have To, Anyway.

A Delicate, Inexorable Lattice Of Inferences Began To Assemble Themselves, Like A Crystal, In The Old Man's Mind, Shivering, Catching The Light In Glints And Surmises.