Publishing your work is important. Even if you are giving a piece to some smaller publication for free, you will learn something about your writing. The editor will say something, friends will mention it. You will learn.

Mystery is a resource, like coal or gold, and its preservation is a fine thing.

The way one approaches a wilderness story is to fashion a quest - find something that you are truly interested in finding or discovering.

You have to first be a writer and somebody who loves to write. If I couldn't travel, I would still write.

There's a story everywhere. Being bored to death someplace is basically a funny proposition. What you have to watch out for is you don't write a boring story about a boring place.