Don't Be Sad That Roses Have Thorns.

I Had A Teacher Once, Grade School Somewhere. Philippines, I Think, Because She Always Wore A Big White Hat. So It Was Somewhere Hot. I Was Always Twice The Size Of The Other Kids, And She Used To Say To Me: Count To Ten Before You Get Mad, Reacher. And I've Counted Way Past Ten On This One. Way Past.

It's A Kind Of Zen Question: If You Write A Book And No One Reads It, Is It Really A Book?

I Wanted Readers To Be Genuinely Unsure As To Whether She's Telling The Truth Or Lying. It Meant Making Her Partly Sympathetic, And Partly Unsympathetic, Which Wasn't Easy.

So Long As Readers Keep Reading And My Publishers Keep Publishing, I Plan To Keep On Writing. I'd Have To Be An Idiot To Be Burnt-out In This Job.

I've Discovered Writers By Reading Books Left In Airplane Seats And Weird Hotels.