My second book, Follow Me Down had some success, got good critical notices, went into a second printing and things like that, but Shiloh was by far the most successful of those first five novels.

And I'm a slow writer: five, six hundred words is a good day. That's the reason it took me 20 years to write those million and a half words of the Civil War.

I prize the Depression, for instance, because I learned the value of things in the Depression that a way people who don't have to worry about such things never learned to prize it really, I believe.

Of all the passions of mankind, the love of novelty most rules the mind. In search of this, from realm to realm we roam. Our fleets come loaded with every folly home.

Meeting with people is awesome in every sense of the word. It can inspire you with glee. It can inspire you with happiness. It can inspire you with sadness and melancholy, but also hope.

If the script is telling the story well, that is your inspiration, and you do not need to go somewhere else.

Never give up your day job. I do all sorts of things, but at the end of the day, it all boils down to 'The Today Show,' and I love doing this thing, and they will have to blow me out of here with dynamite before I leave.

I believe in the cause, and I believe in the people, and by supporting Music Rights Awareness, I very much hope - and believe - we can make a difference.