Instead, I was interested in what I guess I could call narrative indeterminacy, in questioning the apparent, taken-for-granted authority of any particular representation of the events in question.

There were a lot of adventure books for boys, historical novels by Kenneth Roberts, and whatever mystery novels the alarmed librarian imagined might not corrupt an eager but innocent youth.

As soon as I started writing Julia, by which I mean while writing its first sentence, I felt a sudden, reassuring charge of excitement. I knew it was going to work.

I generally wade in blind and trust to fate and instinct to see me through.

These days, there are a great many books about childhood trauma and its effects, but at the time all the experts agreed that one should forget about it as quickly as possible and pick up where you left off.

The actual Blue Rose murders, which lie at the core of the three novels, yield various incorrect solutions which assume the status of truth.

Instead, I was interested in what I guess I could call narrative indeterminacy, in questioning the apparent, taken-for-granted authority of any particular representation of the events in question.

I had a connoisseur's... appreciation of fear.

I write longer sentences than most of the others, maybe because I probably like Henry James more than they do.

If I planned everything out in advance, I'd expire of boredom.

When, in the third book, we do learn the identity of the Blue Rose murderer, the information comes in a muted, nearly off-hand manner, and the man has died long before.

I believe I encountered death, which was a bit too much for a seven-year-old.

Everyone wants to get better as they go along, but sometimes it's all you can do to stay consistent.

Each new book is a tremendous challenge.

There have been times when I reread - or at least leafed through - something because I'd sent a copy to a friend, and what usually happened was that I noticed dozens and dozens of clumsy phrases I wished I could rewrite.

However, I think I managed to reach a new level with Koko, and I will always be grateful for the experience.

On gym days, I don't get to my desk until 4 in the afternoon, and everything except bedtime and the appointment with the liquid narcotic is pushed back a bit.

Fear and I were old buddies, despite my best efforts to the contrary.

Dick Dart emerged from the ether during a flight from New York with my wife and children to Puerto Rico.

I instantly chucked my academic ambitions and began writing fiction full-time.

Many fiction writers eventually want to feel that their work forms a single, unified entity.

An average working day begins at 8 or 9 am, includes an hour for lunch, and ends at 5 or 6 pm.

My first real breakthrough collided with the last months of Callaghan's Labour government, which had every intention of enjoying my success as much as I did.

Nobody is surprised that women writers accurately represent male characters over and over again, no doubt because everybody knows that women understand men much better than vice-versa.

The burnt odor in Washington is from the disintegrating authority of the governing classes.

If you look to lead, invest at least 40% of your time managing yourself - your ethics, character, principles, purpose, motivation, and conduct. Invest at least 30% managing those with authority over you, and 15% managing your peers.

All wars come to an end, at least temporarily. But the authority acquired by the state hangs on; political power never abdicates.

Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory.

I call religion a natural authority, but it has usually been conceived as a supernatural authority.

But in our age the appeal to authority is weak, and I am of my age.

And revolutions always mean the breakdown of old authority.

In revolutions authority remains with the greatest scoundrels.

We all agree that we've got to bring these terrorists to justice and to make sure that they're never allowed to perpetrate such an evil act as they did. And so all of us are dealing with that. We know that the President has the authority to go to war under the War Powers Act.

The faith that stands on authority is not faith.

As a result of my study, I came to the conclusion that a common supreme authority was undesirable.

Universal suffrage should rest upon universal education. To this end, liberal and permanent provision should be made for the support of free schools by the State governments, and, if need be, supplemented by legitimate aid from national authority.

The dead and past stories that I have told again in divers fashions, are not set down without authority.

I had learned many years ago in private business never to take responsibility without adequate authority; and the new Secretary of Defense, as budgets were sharply cut, quickly found that out.

The whole basis of the Constitution was a restriction of power, and the whole basis of the federalist system was that there was not one sovereign centralized power from which all authority flows.

God is the King. In him exists all legal authority.

Surround yourself with the best people you can find, delegate authority, and don't interfere as long as the policy you've decided upon is being carried out.

I prize the conditions under which I have lived because they have permitted me to choose my opportunities, to inquire into such matters as interested me, and to publish what I believed to be true, uncontrolled by any central authority.

I believe in a lively disrespect for most forms of authority.

Authority without wisdom is like a heavy ax without an edge, fitter to bruise than polish.

The ultimate authority must always rest with the individual's own reason and critical analysis.

There are millions of kids who, naturally, if we could only remember how it is - you know, you resent authority, you are impatient for change, you want to fix things up.

For which reason I would exhort you to pay all due Regard to the government over us; to the KING and all in authority; and to lead a quiet and peaceable life.

People are so afraid of authority figures and doctors are authority figures.

I was bold in the pursuit of knowledge, never fearing to follow truth and reason to whatever results they led, and bearding every authority which stood in their way.