I wanted to be my own heroine.

Grief doesn't fade. Grief scabs over like my scars and pulls into new, painful configurations as it knits. It hurts in new ways. We are never free from grief.

By the numbers, by all the official records, here at the confluence of history, of racism, of poverty, and economic power, this is what our lives are worth: nothing.

I wrote the first draft of my first novel at Michigan, and then I wrote the first draft of 'Salvage the Bones' at Stanford. So I workshopped the entire thing.

My father owned pit bulls when I was young. He sometimes fought them. My brother and a lot of the men in my community owned pit bulls as well: sometimes they fought them for honor, never for money.

While I've said that there are plenty of things I dislike about the South, I can be clear that there are things I love about the South.

That's why I write fiction, because I want to write these stories that people will read and find universal.

I think that I'm trying to hopefully change my children's ideas about what is possible, and about what is possible for them.

I wanted to write about voodoo tradition that I feel has been very important to survival of black people here: people of the African diaspora, people of this region, and throughout the south.

There is laughter, shrill calls. Everyone is flirting, saying in nudges and jokes and blushing what they would do in private

I'm a failed poet. Reading poetry helps me to see the world differently, and I try to infuse my prose with figurative language, which goes against the trend in fiction.

Our love must not be a thing of words and fine talk. It must be a thing of action and sincerity.

When someone tells you something big, it's like you're taking money from them, and there's no way it will ever go back to being the way it was. You have to take responsibility for listening.

Whatever evil befalls us we ought to ask ourselves ... how we can turn it into good. So shall we take occasion from one bitter root to raise perhaps many flowers.

Politics is a noble activity. We should revalue it, practise it with vocation and a dedication that requires testimony, martyrdom, that is to die for the common good.

To be a drummer you also have to be a musician.

Influencers influence people and the people who they influence.

With TV, the most important thing is just to get people to turn it on.

No inspiration comes from nowhere. No invention is based on nothing. You always need to be tuned up and be ready to start receiving the energy you look for.

Our forefathers would think it's time for a revolution. This is why they revolted in the first place... They revolted against much more mild oppression.

I've always made music - pretty much since I was born.