There's always going to be comparisons, and that's unavoidable. There are people out there who feel I hit my peak with Magician and have gone downhill since.

There were two things going on: 1) I had already established in my own mind where I wanted to go with the next series, and having James around as a Grey Eminence would have complicated matters. He had had an amazing life and it was time to bid him good-bye.

Often I'll try things that just won't happen the way I'd like them to, so hearing that they're not working saves me some wear and tear the next time around.

You can only have one first born child. You may love all your children deeply and with passion, but there is something unique about the first born.

In the end, my reasons for moving down the timeline and introducing a new cast have more to do with keeping myself entertained, on the assumption that if I get bored, my readers are going to be even more bored.

The issue of the Betrayal was so central to that, I felt the need to comment upon it. My choices were to ignore the games and put them "outside" of continuity or to integrate them. I chose the latter.

One likes to think one grows as a writer as one ages, else all you get is an "old" young writer. Beyond that is the changing landscape of the universe and the stories I choose to tell.

There's always going to be comparisons, and that's unavoidable. There are people out there who feel I hit my peak with Magician and have gone downhill since.

One of the key issues will be personal honour vs. the good of the many, and unforeseen consequences.

Neal had a couple of good ideas and they fit nicely, so that's the way I decided to go.

Also, it's risky to try to duplicate earlier success. Magician had a certain charm to it, mostly due to my choice of lead characters, that I would be hard put to duplicate.

Jigsaw Lady is the working title of a science fiction novel I've had in my head for darn near 15 years. I think I'll start work on it next year (in all my spare time) but I'd like to get it finished some day.

I'm a huge fan of Cabernet and Bordeaux, and am passionate about Pinot Noir and Burgundies.

If I leave my computer, I'm probably not going to get back for hours. If I take a few minutes to answer questions and go web surfing, then guilt kicks in and I get back to work.

Writing is hard work; it's also the best job I've ever had.

As a kid, I sat transfixed watching Ray Harryhausen's '7th Voyage of Sinbad.'

Either systems are in balance or they are falling apart. If people are acting in what appears to be a twisted way, I want to know the reason for that.

I don't like fantasy where a king snaps his fingers and suddenly a whole army appears and goes off to war - he's got to feed them, he's got to pay them, he's got to take care of the camp followers and the gamblers and the people who cause disorder.

I feel when a writer treats a character as 'precious,' the writer runs the risk of turning them into a comic book character. There's nothing wrong with comic book characters in comic books, but I don't write comic books.

I keep threatening to write a non-fantasy book, and they keep offering me the kind of money I can't refuse to write a fantasy. That's a good thing. I have to pay my mortgage, and I have to pay for my Chargers season tickets.

I won't say that writing is therapy, but for me, the act of writing is therapy. The ability to be productive is good for my mental health. It's always better for me to be writing than vegetating on some couch.

I've never worried about 'the reader' because there isn't one. There are thousands, and they all have strong opinions, from 'Magician' was the best ever,' and I've gone downhill since to 'The new book is the best ever,' so to whom to I listen? So I write for myself and hope other people like it.

Mostly I'm writing about people, so I feel constrained to take with me my view of people, my curiosity about how people choose the things they do and why they come to certain decisions in a certain fashion and all the things that drive most writers.

One likes to think one grows as a writer as one ages, else all you get is an 'old' young writer. Beyond that is the changing landscape of the universe and the stories I choose to tell.

People like rules, or at least the appearance of rules, even in fantasy.

Science fiction is fantasy about issues of science. Science fiction is a subset of fantasy. Fantasy predated it by several millennia. The '30s to the '50s were the golden age of science fiction - this was because, to a large degree, it was at this point that technology and science had exposed its potential without revealing the limitations.

The issue of the Betrayal was so central to that, I felt the need to comment upon it. My choices were to ignore the games and put them 'outside' of continuity or to integrate them. I chose the latter.

When you talk about fantasy, the usual problem is that whilst you've got the world of imagination, there are no controlling forces.

Writing is not a competitive sport. Everyone that writes has his or her own voice.

Altruism accrues little benefit to those lying cold in the gutter.

There is no idea so brilliant or original that a sufficiently untalented writer cant screw it up.

I think that's created a healthy environment. The comparisons to "ER" were maddening and there was this assumption that the two of us were looking at each other with rage and resentment, which was also not the case.

People will always make comparisons.

All comparisons between America's current place in the world and anything legitimately called an empire in the past reveal ignorance and confusion about any reasonable meaning of the concept empire, especially the comparison with the Roman Empire.

Once people start making comparisons to a player of the past, they want you to be that player. I try to go out there and create my own image, my own style, my own type of game. Right now I can't even think of one guy I've been compared to.

We were in the same band, but we're two completely different people. People have asked me to make comparisons with our albums, and I can't, because there's no comparison. Her album's okay. I don't think she's the best singer on Earth, but she's okay.

Judgment traps you within the limitations of your comparisons. It inhibits freedom.

I think comparisons are odious.

Things are as they are. Looking out into it the universe at night, we make no comparisons between right and wrong stars, nor between well and badly arranged constellations.

But sequence comparisons simply can't account for the development of complex biochemical systems any more than Darwin's comparison of simple and complex eyes told him how vision worked.

But it really wasn't until three to four years later, when we had an opportunity in the lab to make very detailed observations, and comparisons with other fossil discoveries, that we realized she was a new species of human ancestor.

I worked at NBC and MTV for two years, and it was very interesting to see the comparisons of audiences and the way that I would have to present a story to the two different places.

A wise man looks upon men as he does on horses; all their comparisons of title, wealth, and place, he consider but as harness.

Because of recent improvements in the accuracy of theoretical predictions based on large scale ab initio quantum mechanical calculations, meaningful comparisons between theoretical and experimental findings have become possible.

There's always going to be comparisons, and that's unavoidable. There are people out there who feel I hit my peak with Magician and have gone downhill since.

Comparisons are really no good in sport, especially if it is a comparison between different eras and generations, for there are so many variables that come into play, starting from the quality of the opposition to playing conditions.

The mind of a human being is formed only of comparisons made in order to examine analogies, and therefore cannot precede the existence of memory.

The surest route to breeding jealousy is to compare. Since jealousy comes from feeling less than another, comparisons only fan the fires.

I have never believed in comparisons, whether they are about different eras, players or coaches.