As writers, we don't just need to write about poverty or war or the immigrant experience.

I want to say that, in general, when it works, open adoption is great.

History releases me from my own experience and jogs my fictional imagination.

It would be a lie to say that people are coming to adoption with joy at all times. Hope, perhaps, but it would be disingenuous to say that every part coming to an adoption isn't seriously grieving.

I feel like if writers used writing as therapy we'd have a ton of happy writers.

I think that when the world feels safe and secure, we probably feel more that way in our personal lives. What goes on in the world affects us, unequivocally.

The past always sort of haunts us and perhaps inspires us in some ways.

I'm a morning person: if I don't get up, put the coffee on and get to my desk by 8, the day has already lost a lot of its promise.

The birth mother is placing the baby out of love. I still believe that. Well, the ones weve dealt with who were actually pregnant, anyway.

I feel sometimes like a book tour is a slow series of humiliations and that if you're strong you'll come out of it OK.

I find I have to touch what I am working on every day, or a deep-seated dread kicks in that is very hard to overcome.

Death waits for no man - and if he does, he doesn't usually wait for very long.

Note to self-give serious thought to becoming an alcoholic.

Hi! handsome hunting manFire your little gun.Bang! Now the animalis dead and dumb and done.Nevermore to peep again, creep again, leap again, Eat or sleep or drink again. Oh, what fun!

Human relations are built on feeling, not on reason or knowledge. And feeling is not an exact science; like all spiritual qualities, it has the vagueness of greatness about it.

Rodeoing is about the only sport you can't fix. You'd have to talk to the bulls and horses, and they wouldn't understand you.

Whenever anyone, Buddhist or not, sees a Temple or an image of Buddha they receive blessings.

No child really chooses his religion; it is just the luck of the draw which blanket of beliefs you are wrapped in.

The good and bad are all tangled up together. American popular music is loved around the world because of its African rhythm. But that wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for slavery.

I'd much rather fail than do something like 'The Chorus Line' movie, sanitized and Hollywoodized.

Every imperial agent wants to reduce what is possible to what is available.