Keeping your head down and just writing is only part of the equation, so I surround myself with smart people to help sell my books.

In the TV world, we are seeing a lot more power going to the writer. I sense it is a writer's medium.

I watched 'Kojak' religiously with my father. It was a great bonding time. He loved shows where the stakes were high. Life and death, justice prevailing, things like that. I think that helped set me on the path to what I do now.

The criminal defense attorney is misunderstood if not despised by most of society. It doesn't matter if we believe in our adversarial system and the ideal that everyone charged with a crime is entitled to a vigorous defense. Ideals give away to reality - defense lawyers working loopholes and angles to get their clients off.

I get into this unfortunate thing when I'm touring for my books. I was in Spain, and the media asked me, 'Who's your favorite Spanish mystery writer?' I'm totally flat-footed. I feel that I'm under-read when it comes to foreign writers.

As a reporter, you develop an ear for dialogue because it's your job to capture it accurately.

I mostly read on airplanes and right before sleep.

I think there's a general misconception that anything written quickly lacks quality, and I don't believe that.

I want to tell stories that reflect how people are feeling.

Every time I visit Brisbane, I think, 'This is my childhood.'

When I was at a newspaper, I knew what an opportunity that was, and I religiously protected my time on the cop beat.

We're all seeking order. We're all seeking control.

My whole reputation and creative thought as a novelist is really wrapped around Harry Bosch, so he's near and dear.

That's the irony in the work: the best stories are the worst things that happen. My best times were somebody else's worst.

There are nineteen Harry Bosch books, and someone told me if you add up the descriptions of Harry from all of them, it would come to less than three pages. He's very elliptically described over the two decades during which the novels occur. I did that by intention.

I first discovered Tampa in my 20s when I met my wife, who was living there, and I instantly fell in love with the city. It's somewhere between a big city and small town, so you get the feeling of both.

The fulfillment I get from a good day of writing is addictive and will always bring me back the next day.

The LAPD, like most police departments, is a male-dominated bureaucracy. A woman faces a lot of pushback.

When I went home at 20 to tell my parents, 'I don't want to be an engineer, I want to try and write books,' I was braced for, 'That's not gonna happen.' But I didn't get that response, and maybe it was because of my dad's experience of having an artistic dream and having to put it aside.

I have high hopes for Renee Ballard's literary life, and it can't start out better than the top of 'USA TODAY''s best-seller list.

When I lived in L.A. full time, I moved often - fourteen different neighbourhoods in sixteen years.

As soon as I got to L.A., there was this big crime where these guys tunnelled underneath a bank on a three-day weekend and went right up to the vault and emptied everything out.

Artists are supposed to stay hungry.

I got lucky, and the first book, 'The Black Echo,' got published.

I not only read Raymond Chandler but read all the crime fiction classics. I was hooked.

My grandparents were all born in the U.S., but their parents came from Ireland.

I was fired as an actor on 'Bosch.'

You know that song, 'New York, New York?' If I can make it here, I'll make it anywhere? That's kind of like L.A.

The three books I've written in Florida about L.A. are my best takes on the physicality of the city, as far as description goes.

I don't think anyone will believe me, but I've never been pressured by a publisher to churn out a book.

I've sold 11 of my books to Hollywood. There are all kinds of my books on shelves in Hollywood because the scripts didn't capture the characters.

I never write thinking, 'What would a woman do?' any more than I think, 'What would a man do?' It comes down to what would a solid detective do in these circumstances.

I learned to write crime novels by reading people I hoped to emulate: people like James Lee Burke, Lawrence Block, Joseph Wambaugh, and Sue Grafton.

In 'Blood Work,' they made choices I wouldn't have made, but I'm not a filmmaker. I took the money, and they told the story.

I think I would spend the first 30 weeks not writing, just clearing my head and seeing parts of the world I haven't seen and going back to places I have seen and love.

As far as characters in fiction that I really admire - it's pretty strong to say you would wish that you had created another character - but I'll throw out Will Graham, the protagonist in 'Red Dragon,' a book I've read several times.

We want our government to protect us, to make sure something like 9/11 never happens again. We quickly moved to give law enforcement more power to do this. But that now begs the question, did we move to fast? Did we give too much power away? I don't have the answer.

I write my books never thinking of an actor.

Many writers learned their craft and work ethic at a newspaper. I benefited from that.

I like stories about people who have to go into darkness for a good reason and then have to figure out how to deal with the darkness that seeps into their souls.

I feel I'm functioning at some level as a journalist because even though I write fiction, I'm trying to get the world accurate.

In a daydream sort of way, I think it would be pretty cool to direct a movie. But I have been on movie and TV sets and know it is hard work. I like directing it in my mind. It is easier.

I've always thought of L.A. as the modern version of 'The Garden of Earthly Delights.'

I love movies. Movies have influenced me as a writer.

I think it's pretty apparent who my favorites are because I keep coming back to them. At the top of that list would be Harry Bosch, who's now going on 20 years of literary life. I still like him the best because there's still a lot to say about him.

I'm just going to write the best books I can.

I'm not Mr. Hollywood. I'm a book writer.

I wrote my first real murder story as a journalist for the Daytona Beach News Journal in 1980. It was about a body found in the woods. Later, the murder was linked to a serial killer who was later caught and executed for his crimes.

I realize now I could have gotten a whole book out of that and so I think that was a big mistake. But the truth is you write in the moment and with your head down and there is no way back then that I could have conceived of Harry having the longevity that he has had.

I never miss L.A. because I'm there enough.