After my years in Hollywood, I got tired of apologizing for work that really wasn't mine to begin with.

Ideas are easy. It's the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats.

Books are like movies of the mind and it's better to leave Kinsey where she is.

I'm not sure Kinsey has changed in these first twelve books. I think the reader learns more about her, but from Kinsey's perspective, only three years have passed while the rest of us have been getting older at a much faster clip.

I don't want to write formula. I don't want to crank these books out like sausages. Every book is different, which takes a hell of a lot of ingenuity on my part.

I spent the first twenty years of my writing career preparing for the mystery genre, which is my favorite literary form.

Kinsey was never a lawyer. She's strictly blue collar.

I focus on the writing and let the rest of the process take care of itself. I've learned to trust my own instincts and I've also learned to take risks.

I've never written about my husband, Steve, or any of my children because I know them all too well. I see them in all their complexities which makes them impossible to render on the printed page.

Having reached the halfway mark in the alphabet, my prime focus is on writing each new book as well as I can.

We all need to look into the dark side of our nature - that's where the energy is, the passion. People are afraid of that because it holds pieces of us we're busy denying.

I started writing seriously when I was 18, wrote my first novel when I was 22, and I've never stopped writing since.

The truth is, I could no more dictate her nature than she could dictate mine. Kinsey's happy as she is and she doesn't need to be rescued, improved, or saved.

The character of Rosie is based on a woman who used to live in the same apartment building I lived in many years ago. She's taken on a life of her own, of course.

Of the first seven novels I wrote, numbers four and five were published. Numbers one, two, three, six, and seven, have never seen the light of day... and rightly so.

I was an English major in college with minors in Fine Arts and Humanities.

At that point, I sat down and made an alphabetical list of all the crime related words I could think of. So here I am now, nearly half-way through, probably tied up until the year 2015 or SO.

Henry is entirely invented though by now I feel he's as real as anyone I know.

I attended the University of Louisville my freshman year, transferred to what was then Western Kentucky State Teachers College for my sophomore and junior years, and then graduated from the University of Louisville in the summer of 1961.

My primary lesson, however, was that I'm a solo writer, happiest when I'm making all the executive decisions. I've always been willing to rise or fall on my own merits.

After my years in Hollywood, I got tired of apologizing for work that really wasn't mine to begin with.

If high heels were so wonderful, men would be wearing them.

I love being single. It's almost like being rich.

Thinking is hard work, which is why you don't see many people doing it.

When all else fails cleaning house is the perfect antidote to most of lifes ills.

Everything happens for a reason but that doesnt mean theres a point.

Ideas are easy. Its the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats.

Ive never known anyone yet who doesnt suffer a certain restlessness when autumn rolls around... Were all eight years old again and anything is possible.

If high heels were so wonderful men would be wearing them.

In my opinion, there's no condition in life that can't be ameliorated by a dose of junk food.

You try to keep life simple but it never works, and in the end all you have left is yourself.

Pay minimum wage, you get minimum work. Nobody seems to get that.

Poise and indifference so often look the same.

It is a truth of human nature that we can ponder life's mysteries for only so long before we lose interest and move on to something else.

Some people can't see the color red. That doesn't mean it isn't there.

I know there are people who believe you should forgive and forget. For the record, I'd like to say I'm a big fan of forgiveness as long as I'm given the opportunity to get even first.

We all respect sincerity in our friends and acquaintances, but Hollywood is willing to pay for it.

I was lucky enough to occasionally break out of that racist situation that prevails in the Hollywood film production community. But it was racist then and it will always be that way. It will never be otherwise.

Awards were made in Hollywood, in whatever the time it was created. They're to promote each other's movies. You give me an award, I give you an award and people will believe that we are great movies and they'll go to see them. It's still the same.

I've always thought John Travolta is one of the greatest movie stars Hollywood has ever produced.

It could be my downfall, but I don't think it is - Hollywood is run on perception, and if you stray off the path of what you want to do with your career, it's suicide.

The best thing I can think of would be to create a union between something as beautiful and powerful and wonderful as Hollywood films and a criticism of the status quo. That's my dream, to make such a German film.

Growing up in Hollywood it seemed like every kid was the child of some star. We had no idea that other people would think we were special, because there was no other lifestyle to compare it to.

I remember having to take detours around the Hollywood sign to avoid having to see this grotesque poster of myself on Sunset Boulevard.

Hollywood is kind of a bad world.

It's so crazy in Hollywood.

I don't think I ever understood Hollywood.

I came across awful characters when I got some kind of status and came to Hollywood. Then you have directors trying to sleep with you, assuming that you will do things because of the way you dress.

Hollywood is sexist and age-ist, and that covers all the bases, I guess.