A book can’t be a half-fantasy any more than a woman can be half pregnant

Nothing attunes you to the beauty of the quotidian like a man who decides not to kill you after all

The empowered may serve justice, remodel the Earth, transform lush nations into smoking battlefields, and bring down skyscrapers, but power itself is amoral.

Power and moneyLike Pooh Bear and honeyStick fast.

Not a clue – and, no, I don’t touch drugs. The world’s unstable enough without scrambling your brain for kicks.

Nonfiction that smells like fiction is neither.

Books’ll be back, ” Esther-in-Unalaq predicts. “Wait till the power grids start failing in the 2030s and the datavats get erased. It’s not far away. The future looks a lot like the past.

The Future, ” says Ian, in a film-trailer voice. “Coming soon, to a Present near you.

Prayer may be a placebo for the disease of helplessness, but placebos can make you feel better.

Here’s the truth: Who is spared love is spared grief.

And grade every simile and metaphor from one star to five, and remove any threes or below. It hurts when you operate, but afterwards you feel much better.

It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.

If love happens because of a reason then the same love will disappear for another reason.

I grew up in Los Angeles in a Quaker family, and for me being Quaker was a political calling rather than a religious one.

You never date someone's ex-boyfriend. Period. That's not even the unspoken rule - that's the spoken rule.

Lorna was quite young when her mother died, and I think she's blocked out some of the memories. I talked to her a little bit about that, but I wasn't prepared to go around and poke and hurt her.

We perceive no charms that are not sharpened, puffed out, and inflated by artifice. Those which glide along naturally and simply easily escape a sight so gross as ours.

We have to change this whole earth into a tremendous festival, and it is possible because man brings all that is needed to transform this earth into a paradise.

You know very well that whether you are on page one or page thirty depends on whether they fear you. It's as simple as that.

As a competitor and an athlete, you have to believe in yourself. And you have to believe in the people who believe in you.

I never exploited my father’s role in helping Jews avoid the concentration camps...