People are complicated. Personally I don't go in for puritanical people.

Every person has a range. In fiction, you get to be it all. I’m as much the men in my book as I am the women. I write how I write and there is no mission to stake a claim.

To be alive is to listen quietly while other people talk. That's how you learn something.

I was doing that thing the infatuated do, stitching destiny onto the person we want stitched to us.

I’d been listening to men talk since I arrived in New York City. That’s what men like to do. Talk. Profess like experts. When one finally came along who didn’t say much, I listened.

Danzon is my favorite Cuban music, played by a traditional string orchestra with flute and piano. It's very formally structured but romantic music, which derives from the French-Haitian contradance.

People who want their love easy don't really want love.

For me, truth cracks open in the places where things do not cohere. That's how life is.

It's amazing how life conspires to set you up with what you need.

A funny thing about women and machines: the combination made men curious.

I don't regard the real and true and authentic as something to claim as a moral high ground.

Children of the light, walk in the light.

Sarah learnt a lot from Alex. Like the way men could say one thing, then another, then act in a way inconsistent with both positions and somehow still be convinced of their own integrity.

Your ego can become an obstacle to your work. If you start believing in your greatness, it is the death of your creativity.

My biggest success is getting over the things that have tried to destroy and take me out of this life. Those are my biggest successes. It has nothing to do with work.

I don't think I prefer writing for one age group above another. I am just as pleased with a story which I feel works well for very small children as I do with a story for young adults.

I want people to think about the connection between mothers and daughters. I like the idea of continuity of life and generations.

Advertising has annihilated the power of the most powerful adjectives.

Reality is the temporary resultant of continuous struggles between rival gangs of programmers.

So many other things for us to see, Things to be, Our history so full of tragedy and misery.

If you grew up in my generation, you're going to be influenced by Run DMC, the Beastie Boys and also listen to Metallica - it wasn't segregated anymore.