Really, what is the law when it stands in the way of what the government wants to do?

You kill one, there was another in his place, and what's worse, his nephew now hated you, his friend now hated you. . . . There was no end.

It didn't take much prompting for Cariocas who were sick of living with violence to advocate violence as a solution.

The snooze button is useless if you love life enough to get up on time.

Accept the challenges so that you can feel the exhilaration of victory.

Set your goals high, and don't stop till you get there.

I think it is more like a ghost that has been following us both. Something vague that we're not seeing, something more like a feeling.

To me it seems that liberty and virtue were made for each other. If any man wish to enslave his country, nothing is a fitter preparative than vice; and nothing leads to vice so surely as irreligion.

All one can do for one's character in times like these, is to prove that one does not belong to these times.

Credit and debt keep us fixated on the past and the future.

If there's a theme in my work, it's that I like to focus on smart people who are facing oppression and who are fighting back against it.

The human capacity for compassion is not a reflex that is triggered automatically by the presence of another living thing.

Tod Goldberg has long been one of the most interesting writers around, and Gangsterland is his biggest and best book so far.