I don't even know what a serious literary critic is.

In life, finding a voice is speaking and living the truth. Each of you is an original. Each of you has a distinctive voice. When you find it, your story will be told. You will be heard.

One thing you really have to watch as a writer is getting on a soapbox or pulpit about anything. You don't want to alienate readers.

You live your life today, Not tommorow, and certainly not yesterday.

Prisons are fascinating places, especially when the inmates are educated white-collar types.

Jesus preached more and taught more about helping the poor and the sick and the hungry than he did about heaven and hell. Shouldn't that tell us something?

When witnesses concoct lies, they often miss the obvious.

If you're gonna be stupid you gotta be tough.

When you work at street level you never know who's going to walk through your door.

Shame was an emotion he had abandoned years earlier. Addicts know no shame. You disgrace yourself so many times you become immune to it.

judge not that ye be not judged

When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.

I meet people and they become chapters in my stories.

No...No...We don't walk away but when we're holding on to something precious we run. We run away. We run as fast as we can.

Learn it all, then forget it all.

I'm now much more aware of my mental state. I have a lot more control over it and can choose how I feel.

The question is: How do we succeed in Iraq? And you don't succeed by leaving before the mission is complete, like some in this political process are suggesting.

The only way you can fail is if you stop praying.

People knew that Murdoch's media estate in the UK was too powerful and it was doing very unpleasant things.

Real travel would be to see the world, for even an instant, with another's eyes

There are only two sorts of greatness: true greatness, which is of a spiritual order, and the old, old lie of world conquest. Conquest is an ersatz greatness.