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

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.

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.

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

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

If you try to do a task at your odd hours, you will waste so much time only to find out that you did a poor job after all.

Everyone is a different book, with a different cover, different contain but the question is do you dare to open it?

These are open secrets, so to speak. Of the kind we dare not articulate, for fear of wounding those close to us.

I am always looking for a cool tee shirt maybe one with a rock band or an old advertisement.

You couldn't forget Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse and Joan Miro either. And it had to be, you know, at least as good or better.

I'm an old-timer in the business from the sense that when you do something that you feel good about there might be another person out there who feels the same way, or a hundred or a couple million.

A woman's spirit blossoms in the colors of her soul.

Prudence in action avails more than wisdom in conception.

I like the blues a lot. I grew up on it.

In a course of a lifetime, what does it matter?