"If you write, one of the questions you're always trying to answer is, Where do you get your ideas? And, if you write, you know how pointless a question this is and how difficult it is to answer."

"Wisdom principle 3 tells us that the journey of life is lesson 89."

"Wisdom principle 34 tells us that the journey of life is lesson 7."

"It is a unyielding truth that he who inspires courage in a single soul has led a monumental campaign."

"I have encouraged my kids to eat well from day one. I add flavor - herbs and spices - to everything because I don't want them getting used to starchy, bland food. I also want them to experiment - they don't have to love everything, but they do have to try it."

"The universe speaks in the silent dialect of universal natural laws. For where clarity resides, peace inevitably follows — an essential principle for the reflective life."

"We sat around on a hotel balcony with a bottle of wine and tried to figure out how you would go about blowing up a planet. That's the kind of conversations science fiction writers have when they get together. We don't talk about football or anything like that."

"I walk every day, and I look at the mountains and the fields and the small city, and I say: 'Oh my God, what a blessing.' Then you realise it's important to put it in a context beyond this woman, this man, this city, this country, this universe."