Before you speak, my friend, remember, a spiritual man contain his anger. Angry words are like slap in de face.

What I've come to learn is that the world is never saved in grand messianic gestures, but in the simple accumulation of gentle, soft, almost invisible acts of compassion.

You know, you can steel your heart against any kind of trouble, any kind of horror. But the simple act of kindness from a complete stranger will unstitch you.

In this time of the Internet and nonfiction, to be on an actual bookshelf in an actual bookstore is exciting in itself.

What we know about who we are comes from stories. It's the agents of our imagination who really shape who we are.

The privilege of being a writer is that you have this opportunity to slow down and to consider things.

People think that writing is writing, but actually writing is editing. Otherwise, you're just taking notes

My friend Ronald Gottesman says...that the cause of all our trouble is the belief in an essential, pure identity: religious, ethnic, historical, ideological.

You can count on Scandinavian literature for a certain kind of darkness, a modern mythic style.

Men do communicate, often very directly, but women sometimes cannot accept how simple what we have to say is. We seldom play games--we aren't that sophisticated.

Time was the only variable in every equation of power and oppression--how long before the pot boiled over.

You are only happy in life if you forget the bad things and focus on the good things

Inspiration for my short stories grows from a psychic kernel, a vision of some sort or an eccentric, colorful dream.

Greatness should have no victimsGreatness should need no victims.

The visual aspect of a dish is so important the shapes and colors and overall design have to strike the right mood and convey the right idea.

It's a sad commentary when I have to say that sometimes in our country we are real sensitive to race.

Women must be full partners in development, so they can lift themselves and their communities out of poverty.

Part of me says that no life will work if I can't make this one right.

The usual rejoinder to someone who says 'They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Galileo' is to say 'But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown'.

I believe that in each generation God has called enough men and women to evangelize all the yet unreached tribes of the earth. It is not God who does not call. It is man who will not respond!

There is a good deal of evidence that the United States is moving to the right, and that the main force behind the movement is a resurgence, in a new form, of racial prejudice.