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" I've had some wonderful successes and some extreme disappointments in my career and my life. "

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" The silence was part of the story I wanted to tell. "

" I have long observed that the act of writing is viewed, by some, as an elite and otherworldly act, all the more so if a person isn't paid for what she writes. "

" There is a theme that runs through my work, and that is: the toxic property of keeping secrets. "

" I do not outline. There are writers I know and count as my friends who certainly do it the other way, but for me, part of the adventure is not knowing how it's going to turn out. "

" It is not the task of a reader to please her subjects. "

" My job is writing. I get paid to do it. When was the last time you heard someone challenge a doctor for making money off of cancer? "

" Although Salinger had long since cut me out of his life completely and made it plain that he had nothing but contempt for me, the thought of becoming the object of his wrath was more than I felt ready to take on. "

" More than any other setting - more than battlefields or boardrooms or a spaceship headed for intergalactic travel - I'll put my money on the family to provide an endless source of comedy, tragedy and intrigue. "

" Not only did I avoid speaking of Salinger; I resisted thinking about him. I did not reread his letters to me. The experience had been too painful. "

" If I told you about all the stories I don't tell, I would be violating the very boundaries I set for myself. "

" Growing up in the fifties and sixties, I can only remember knowing one child, ever, whose parents got a divorce, and hardly any whose mother 'worked' at anything besides raising her children. "

" The painter who feels obligated to depict his subjects as uniformly beautiful or handsome and without flaws will fall short of making art. "

" I compromised my ability to tell my story, at the most basic level. "

" Those who rhapsodize about the ease and joy of childhood have perhaps forgotten what it's like to be 12 years old. "

" To share our stories is not only a worthwhile endeavor for the storyteller, but for those who hear our stories and feel less alone because of it. "

" When people ask what I write about, that's what I tell them: 'The drama of human relationships.' I'm not even close to running out of material. "

" A person who deserves my loyalty receives it. "

" Some literary types subscribe to the notion that being a writer like Salinger entitles a person to remain free of the standards that might apply to mere mortals. "

" You write about what you know, and you write about what you want to know. "

" It troubles me that people speak about writing for money as ugly and distasteful. "

" I think of myself as a realistic writer, not a creator of soap opera or melodrama. "

" The portrait of my parents is a complicated one, but lovingly drawn. "

" Nothing like being visible, publishing one's work, and speaking openly about one's life, to disabuse the world of the illusion of one's perfection and purity. "

" For 25 years, I did take my responsibilities as a pleaser of others sufficiently seriously. "

" I had known there had been a serial killer on Mount Tamalpais, and it felt so incongruous in such a beautiful, peaceful spot. "

" I was giving a speech one time, and the woman who introduced me said, 'Well, she used to be J. D. Salinger's girlfriend. I thought, 'God, is that all I've been?' I didn't want to be reduced to that. "

" Many women my age have known the experience of giving up crucial parts of themselves to please the man they love. "

" I wonder what it is that the people who criticize me for telling this story truly object to: is it that I have dared to tell the story? Or that the story turns out not to be the one they wanted to hear? "

" I believed my story would be helpful to young women my daughter's age, who are still in the process of forming themselves as women, and in need of encouragement to remain true to themselves. "

" One life is not enough for me. I want to go lots of places. "