I like dark subject matter. I'm not sure what that means about me!

I grew up in Cyprus and Egypt, these fantastic places I remember fondly.

I do no writing while I'm in Belgrade visiting my grandma.

For me it was a lot harder to come to terms with the death of my grandfather than it was to come to terms with what's happened to the former Yugoslavia.

The best fiction stays with you and changes you.

My grandfather and I were very close.

A family has its own rituals and its own superstitions.

Come on, is your heart a sponge or a fist?

We're all entitled to our superstitions.

My mother always says that fear and pain are immediate, and that, when they're gone we're left with the concept, but not the true memory.

I've always written about animals. I'm still trying to process why that is.

Build Bridges NOT Walls!

Be happy for what you have.

Your sorrow will become smaller, like a star in the daylight that you can't even see. It's there, shining, but there is also a vast expanse of blue sky.

I learned to wrestle, I learned defensive fighting at a young age, because when someone hit me, I would throw up and fall down.

Don't be seduced into thinking that that which does not make a profit is without value.

Until you have become really, in actual fact, as brother to everyone, brotherhood will not come to pass.

Lack of money means discomfort, means squalid worries, means shortage of tobacco, means ever-present consciousness of failure-above all, it means loneliness.

I don't feel like I'm very pop-star lame, but I'm definitely not hipster-cool.

In Boston, our strength is really our diversity.

I remember a lot of dreams. Sometimes they are hard to distinguish from what has really happened. That is not so terrible. It is the same with books.