Ms. Schenkar is convinced that if Highsmith had not become a writer, she would have been a murderer. “From age 8 she wanted to kill her stepfather,” she said, strolling north toward Grove Street, “She was born to murder. She had the mind of a criminal genius.

There is always a sheet of paper […] There is always a pen. There is always a way out.

I sympathise with the effort to get a film made at all. I approach a movie with hope, not suspicion. I have an open mind about films that provide their audiences with what they’re looking for and try not to be a snob about that.

It’s the most frequently asked question I receive: How do I get my book published?

Unfortunately, when I hear this question, I know I’m dealing with someone who is at such a beginning stage that it’s difficult to know where to begin.

The timing of death, like the ending of a story, gives a changed meaning to what preceded it.

Freedom is…the right to write the wrong words.

Anything can be addressed to a child audience – you just have to write it better.

Good editors are really the third eye. Cool. Dispassionate. They don’t love you or your work; for me that is what is valuable—not compliments. Sometimes it’s uncanny; the editor puts his or her finger on exactly the place the writer knows is weak but just couldn’t do any better at the time. Or perhaps the writer thought it might fly, but wasn’t sure. Good editors identify that place and sometimes make suggestions. Some suggestions are not useful because you can’t explain everything to an editor about what you are trying to do. I couldn’t possibly explain all of those things to an editor, because what I do has to work on so many levels. But within the relationship if there is some trust, some willingness to listen, remarkable things can happen. I read books all the time that I know would have profited from not a copy editor but somebody just talking through it. And it is important to get a great editor at a certain time, because if you don’t have one in the beginning, you almost can’t have one later.

The good ones make all the difference. It is like a priest or a psychiatrist; if you get the wrong one, then you are better off alone. But there are editors so rare and so important that they are worth searching for, and you always know when you have one.

Without Carroll’s secret ingredient, Alice might never have achieved her fame. “The very first version of [the] Alice in Wonderland story — that he wrote for the real Alice — had none of the mathematics,” Devlin says. “He added a lot of new material and it’s all of that new material where you find the mathematical allusions.

Of course, the previous argument is valid only if, like me, you have always loved reading a little too much and believe that every book changes you. But the effects of e-readers on the publishing industry are widespread, even for someone who would never download A Pluralistic Universe.

She received her last rejection letter in February 2010. Hocking says she hasn’t kept the letter, which is a crying shame because it would surely have been an invaluable piece of self-publishing memorabilia. As far as she can remember, the last “thanks-but-no-thanks” came from a literary agent in the UK. If that agent is reading this article, please don’t beat yourself up about this. We all make mistakes …