As a writer, one is obliged to release her words, to let them live in the world on their own.

As a novelist, I ask of myself only that I tell the truth and that I tell it beautifully.

Every Christmas, all around Ghana, there are tons of these parties and they are full of everything that exists in human life in Ghana and worldwide.

So often, literature about African people is conflated with literature about African politics, as if the state were somehow of greater import or interest than the individual.

The summer I finished my first novel Ghana Must Go, I drove across west Africa: from Accra to Lomé to Cotonou to the deliciously named Ouagadougou.

I wouldn't mind my book being called an African novel if it didn't invite lazy readings.

Being a twin, and being my sister's twin, is such a defining part of my life that I wouldn't know how to be who I am, including a writer, without that being somehow at the centre.

I write essays to clear my mind. I write fiction to open my heart.

The writer presents himself to the blank page not with an open passport but an open heart.

I'm not sure where I'm from! I was born in London. My father's from Ghana but lives in Saudi Arabia. My mother's Nigerian but lives in Ghana. I grew up in Boston.

How can I come from a nation? How can a human being come from a concept?

I have an inward treasure born within me which can keep me alive if all the extraneous delights should be withheld or offered only at a price I cannot afford.

Illogical thinkers throw names and slurs around because they have no arguments with which to rebut their opponents. Rational people have to keep hammering their points home.

She gave up beauty in her tender youth, gave all her hope and joy and pleasant ways; she covered up her eyes lest they should gaze on vanity, and chose the bitter truth.

The real American type can never be a ballet dancer. The legs are too long, the body too supple and the spirit too free for this school of affected grace and toe walking.

To search for wisdom apart from Christ means not simply foolhardiness but utter insanity.

Don't waste even a minute magnifying your perceived inadequacies. You can't do it all. Why berate yourself for not achieving the impossible?

The wolf is neither man's competitor nor his enemy. He is a fellow creature with whom the earth must be shared.

The only questions worth asking today are whether humans are going to have any emotions tomorrow, and what the quality of life will be if the answer is no.

My faith in God is such that I am not afraid.

Personal improvement is like sitting in a movie theater, arguing with the villain projected on the screen, and feeling that at least we have tried to make things better.