I do not outline. There are writers I know and count as my friends who certainly do it the other way but for me part of the adventure is not knowing how it's going to turn out.

She felt everything too deeply, it was like the world was too much for her.

It's not only children who grow. Parents do too.

A person who deserves my loyalty receives it.

The big dramas that fascinate me are the quiet ones that happen behind closed doors in so-called ordinary families.

The painter who feels obligated to depict his subjects as uniformly beautiful or handsome and without flaws will fall short of making art.

At Home in the World is the story of a young woman, raised in some difficult circumstances, and how she survives. It tells a story of redemption, not victimhood.

To share our stories is not only a worthwhile endeavor for the storyteller, but for those who hear our stories and feel less alone because of it.

My job is writing. I get paid to do it. When was the last time you heard someone challenge a doctor for making money off of cancer?

The portrait of my parents is a complicated one, but lovingly drawn.

Those who rhapsodize about the ease and joy of childhood have perhaps forgotten what it's like to be 12 years old.

As we see the beauty of God and feel His weightiness in our hearts, our hearts begin to desire Him more than we desire sin. Before the Bible says, "Stop sinning, " it says, "Behold your God.

I don't play villains, I play very interesting people

An irresponsible person is a person who makes vague promises, then breaks his word, blames it on circumstances and expects other people to forgive it.

Those who have few affairs to attend to are great speakers. The less men think, the more they talk.

I felt like a deer with a hundred hunters after me.

May the days be aimless. Do not advance action according to a plan.

There's no point in getting into politics at all unless you plan to lash things around.

The hoary joke in the literary world, based on 'Dreams From My Father,' was that if things had worked out differently for Barack Obama, he could have made it as a writer.

Rocks whereon greatest men have oftest wreck'd.

The essential characteristic of the first half of the twentieth century is the growing weakness, and almost the disappearance, of the idea of value.