Candace Bushnell quotes:

Well in the book Carrie was my alter ego. In real life, Sarah Jessica and I don't look anything alike. But people do say that we sound alike. Sarah Jessica is an adorable girl and she is very funny.

My parents had a great marriage. Interestingly, it made it harder for me in relationships because I knew what a good relationship looked like.

Well I actually do have a country house in Connecticut with a population of 3,000. Like, how small is that? I spend a lot of time there - I write up there. So I kind of have the best of both worlds and I love going up there.

You don't have to do everything by the time you're 30. Or 40. All you need is a work ethic. It's what allows you to push through moments of disappointment and self-doubt and fear.

Women with money and women in power are two uncomfortable ideas in our society.

If I'm with a man, is that going to prevent me from achieving my goal? What sacrifices will I have to make in terms of being myself, if I'm with a man? Something that young women find out really quickly is that when you start dating, all of a sudden you're supposed to have a role. You're not allowed to just be yourself.

The fact that a man is open to being with an older woman suggests that he doesn't give a hang what other people think of him. More likely, he's confident, open-minded and willing to make his own rules.

I started working for the 'NY Observer' when I was 33. After I had been writing for them for about a year and a half the editor said, 'Your stories are the most talked about stories in the 'Observer'; you should have your own column.'

I'm looking forward to writing more novels for young adults.

The key to life is your attitude. Whether you're single or married or have kids or don't have kids, it's how you look at your life, what you make of it. It's about making the best of your life wherever you are in life.

I was incredibly determined - I wrote short stories, I wrote the beginnings of novels. I wrote a little children's book and sent it to the editor-in-chief of the children's division of Simon and Schuster and she asked me to write a little children's book for a series she was doing.

I have a house in the Connecticut countryside where you'll always find me, summer or winter.

I've been writing fiction probably since I was about 6 years old, so it's something that is second nature to me now. I just sit down and start writing. I don't sit down and start writing and it comes out perfectly - it's a process.

I love things that are old and glittery, that come with layers of glamour and past lives.

New York is a city where people are ambitious. They want things.

We need to encourage young women to find what they love to do. That is a very valuable pursuit - more so than the pursuit of a boyfriend. When you have that core, you bring that core to every aspect of your life.

Growing up, nobody I knew even knew a writer. So it was a big adventure and something that I've wrestled with my whole life. I think it's a journey worth taking, really finding out who you are and what you do well.

As I'm writing, certain things become clear to me and certain things begin to feel right and make sense. The pieces start to fall into place.

The most important thing to strive for in life is some kind of personal and professional achievement. Not as a man or a woman, but as a person.

I started writing about New York as soon as I arrived. I was 19. I used to write short stories and send them out.

The women I know who have children and have careers, they seem to be very happy. They love their children and they love their jobs. But happiness comes out of being willing to do your work in your twenties to find out who you are, what you love.

I think a young woman's relationship with her father is really important.

Ever since I can remember I was telling stories and had a huge interest in other people and what made them tick.

I love Chicago. I lived there briefly for three months and kept a boat under one of those space-age buildings. It was very Jetsons.

I'm really enjoying being single. I'm not even looking to meet anybody, which is so freeing.

There's so many things that mattered so much in my 20s and 30s that don't matter now.

Like it or not, in the end, it's one's body. It's literally what carries you through life. There's a reason for the saying, 'If you have your health, you have everything,' and it's true. Old age, disease - these are the great equalizers.

You need characters who want things. They want love, they want recognition, they want happiness.

Sometimes you have to find the passion. It comes from the inside... Everyone has to find it for themselves.

I wish I was one of those persnickety types who buys guidebooks and studies them, but I don't have the inclination or time. I'm more of a 'get on the plane, arrive at the destination and see what happens' kind of traveler.

Is this better or worse than being married and living in the suburbs? Better or worse? Who can tell?

I sit back on my heels"Aw, sweetie. You can always get another shopping bag--""But I can't get another Marty," she wails"It's me, Carrie. There's something wrong with me. I drive guys away.

I take his hand in mine, running my fingers over the palm. His hands are lovely and lean, and I can't help thinking about those hands on my body. The sexiest part of a man is his hands."

Sometimes I think all the trouble in the world is caused by men. If there were no men, women would always be happy. ~Carrie

I make mistakes. That's what I do. I speak without thinking, I act without knowing. I drink so much that I can barely walk...I'm a fantastic lover though, and an amazing friend. God knows I mean well.

There's a brief moment when you first wake up, where you have no memories. A blissful blank slate, a happy emptiness.

It was ironic, but when you scratched the surface, most successful men were working for one thing only--to retire--and the sooner the better. Whereas women were the complete opposite. She had never heard a woman say she was working so she could retire to a desert island or to live on a boat. It was probably, she thought, because most women didn't think they deserved to do nothing.

Rule number one: Why is it that the one time a cute guy talks to you, you have a friend who's in crisis?

Maybe our girlfriends are our soulmates and guys are just people to have fun with.

Rule number three: Best friends always think you deserve the best guy even if the best guy barely knows you exist.

As Im writing, certain things become clear to me and certain things begin to feel right and make sense. The pieces start to fall into place.

Thank goodness for the first snow, it was a reminder--no matter how old you became and how much you'd seen, things could still be new if you were willing to believe they still mattered.

The '90s are really the 'Sex and the City' woman, and I think, right now, the new contemporary woman is the 'Lipstick Jungle' woman.

Lipstick Jungle' was on the air for 20 episodes - I loved 'Lipstick Jungle.'

I think, when men tell women to lose weight, it's a diversion from their own lack of size in certain areas.

Sex and the City was about looking for Mr Big and trying to find him.

My decorating and renovation skills are nil - indeed, I once used a shower curtain from Pottery Barn as 'window dressing.

Sometimes I want to be on 'The Real Housewives of New York.' I want to remind them to figure out how to get along and support each other.

Retribution is tricky. . . . The insult isn't usually worth the risk of punishment. And eventually one learns that karma has a surprising way of taking care of these situations. All you have to do is sit back and watch.

I actually don't shop very much. I have a tendency to rotate a few pairs of ripped jeans and an old cashmere sweater.

It was the first honest emotional connection I'd had in a while. So I immediately panicked and had to leave.

Man may have discovered fire, but women discovered how to play with it.

I was a freelancer all through my twenties. I did about one story a month and I wanted to write fiction, so the stories that I would do were precursors to 'Sex and the City.'

The joke that I make is that there are instances on the TV series that happen to me, - except on Sex and the City they always make it better or worse than real life and I am actually saying that in a joking way.

What I have yet to see is a real woman choose a younger man because he spent six hours a day at the gym trying to sculpt his abs.

All those men who end up disappointing you. After a while, you don't even want to have feelings anymore. You just want to get on with your life.

I can only hope he's an Aries and not a Scorpio.

Some people are settling down, some people are settling and some people refuse to settle for anything less than butterflies.

So much of being a woman is telling lies

Happiness comes out of being willing to do your work in your twenties to find out who you are, what you love.

Patent leather wedges-they were big when I went to prom!

Guys are like dogs: they never notice if you've changed your hair, but they can sense when there's another guy sniffing around their territory

The reality about being economically dependent on someone else usually doesn't work out for women in the end. It's about being an adult and being responsible for your life. Most women have to work, so let's just get on with it.

Even as a kid, I never liked breakfast. I just don't like to eat then. I like to get up and work. I think sticking a whole bunch of carbohydrates in your stomach in the morning is probably the worst way to begin the day.

I'm the kind of person who would have liked to have lived at the Plaza. I love crystal chandeliers and gold leaf, velvets and mirrors, Oriental rugs and marble.

My decorating and renovation skills are nil - indeed, I once used a shower curtain from Pottery Barn as 'window dressing.'

I sometimes read in a gossip column that I was at a party when I was in Europe at the time. It sometimes feels I've got a Doppelganger somewhere.

Just because something doesn't last forever, it doesn't mean it wasn't meaningful while it did last. It doesn't mean it wasn't important.

sometimes the best thing to do is to pretend it didn't happen

Better alone than badly accompanied.

And if you were always spending your time getting over your past, how were you supposed to get on with your future?

The world is full of people who all want the same thing, and you have to do a little something extra to make them remember you.

Whoever we are here, we might be princesses somewhere else. Or writers. Or scientists. Or presidents. Or whatever the hell we want to be that everyone else says we can't.

The heart wants what the heart wants," she says, somewhat cryptically. I purse my lips in disapproval. "You'd think the heart would know better.

Love is dangerous, if you know it's dangerous, that makes you treasure it, and you'll work harder to keep it.

Maybe some women aren't meant to be tamed. Maybe they just need to run free until they find someone just as wild to run with them. -Carrie Bradshaw

If a woman could take care of herself, would she still need a man? Would she even want one? And if she didn't want a man, what kind of woman would she be? Would she even be a woman? Because it seemed if you were a woman, the only thing you were really supposed to want was a man.

It was scary how a girl couldn't live without friends.

If you smile, even if youâ??re feeling bad, the action of the muscles will trick your brain into thinking youâ??re happy

You have to let go of who you were to become who you will be.

I don't go to parties to meet men. I go to parties to stand in a corner and watch people.

You can get used to anything, I guess, if you've been there enough.

The most important thing in business is a persona, Nico,' he was fond of saying. 'People want to know immediately what they're dealing with. And when they think about you, you've got to stand out in their minds--like one of those characters in a novel.

Who am I supposed to be again? Just be yourself. But who am I?

I can't wait to get out of the house. I can't wait to get out of here. I've been telling myself this all week. The 'getting out of here' part is unspecified, though. Maybe I simply want to get away from life

There is a thin line between attraction and repulsion

Like me, he has a searing belief that books are sacred. They might not be to other people, but when you have a passion, you hold on to it. You defend it. You dont pretend it isn't important at the risk of offending others." -Carrie.

Some secrets are better left at that -as secrets.

I've always thought there are two ways of getting what you wanted in life.Forcing people to give it to you,or making them want to give it to you.

Meanwhile I'll probably see him again. That's how sick I am.

She didn't want to have anything to do with the party. She was tired of feeling like she didn't fit in, but she didn't want to go home, either, because she was a tired of being lonely and she was a little drunk.

Funny always makes the bad things go away.

I have this theory: If you forgive someone, they can't hurt you anymore.

Maybe all men are a drug. Sometimes they bring you down and sometimes, like now, they get you so high.

If you believe in love, you're setting yourself up to be disappointed.

... he was juggling issues and solving problems, which was why his brain had no space left for memories.

In life,there are only four kinds of girls: The girl who played with fire. The girl who opened Pandora's Box. The girl who gave Adam the apple. And the girl whose best friend stole her boyfriend.

I don't want to be a writer so I can write about my life. I want to be a writer to escape from it. + Then you shouldn't be a writer.

Money follows art. Money wants what it can't buy. Class and talent. And remember while there's a talent for making money, it takes real talent to know how to spend it.

All men are a disappointment. No matter what anyone says.

Why do magazines do this to women? It's all about creating insecurity. Trying to make women feel like they're not good enough. And when women don't feel like they're good enough, guess what? Men win. That's how they keep us down.

maybe he's falling in love with the idea of falling in love with me. Maybe he wants to be in love with someone and I've ended up in the right place at the right time.

The heart wants what the heart wants

Should, is the worst word in the English language. People always think things "should" be a certain way, and when they're not, they're disappointed.

I'm not ashamed of anything I've done. Shame is a useless emotion.

It's hard to be careful, though, when you feel indestructible.

I'm certainly not going to put my life on hold for him.

I don't consider my work a job. I consider it a career. And you don't quit a career.

I can safely conclude that we are single because we want to be.

'Lipstick Jungle' was on the air for 20 episodes - I loved 'Lipstick Jungle.'

For me, having it all is being paid to write novels.

Out of all the neighborhoods in Manhattan, Soho in particular had the charged atmosphere of a movie set, populated with passersby who looked like extras from Central Casting, so perfectly did they fit into this environment. There was the feeling of everything being not quite real, or too perfectly cliched to actually be true, and it began to rain in a fine, misty drizzle from a black patent leather sky.

What Sex and the City did for sex and relationships, Lipstick Jungle does for success and power.

Zizi was young and often confused about how to live his life, �and when he made a choice he clung to it with fierce resolve, �as if to beat his uncertainty into submission.

The universe may not always play fair, but at least it's got a hell of a sense of humor.