Two questions form the foundation of all novels: "What if?" and "What next?" (A third question, "What now?", is one the author asks himself every 10 minutes or so; but it's more a cry than a question.) Every novel begins with the speculative question, What if "X" happened? That's how you start.

Not every story started off big enough to notice.

I write strictly for fun... as long as it stays fun I'll continue to do it.

If you don't write the book, the book ain't gonna get written.

Learn to write the same way you learn to play golf. You do it and keep doing it until you get it right.

Success is a finished book, a stack of pages each of which is filled with words. If you reach that point, you have won a victory over yourself no less impressive than sailing single-handed around the world.

I do not over-intellectualize the production process. I try to keep it simple: Tell the damned story.

Keep at it! The one talent that's indispensable to a writer is persistence. You must write the book, else there is no book. It will not finish itself. Do not try to commit art. Just tell the damned story.

Suspense is achieved by information control: What you know. What the reader knows. What the characters know.