We have all this courage as writers, but then there's this fear.

I've put up with too much, too long, and now I'm just too intelligent, too powerful, too beautiful, too sure of who I am finally to deserve anything less.

I am obsessed with becoming a woman comfortable in her skin.

My weapon has always been language, and I've always used it, but it has changed. Instead of shaping the words like knives now, I think they're flowers, or bridges.

You can't erase what you know. You can't forget who you are.

The beauty of literature is you allow readers to see things through other peoples eyes. All good books do this.

'Hispanic' is English for a person of Latino origin who wants to be accepted by the white status quo. 'Latino' is the word we have always used for ourselves.

If you know two cultures and two languages, that intermediate place, where the two don't perfectly meet, is really interesting.

People know when you're speaking from el corazón. You have that pain. Take that pain and do something with it. That's very powerful.

The world we live in is a house on fire and the people we love are burning.

You don't want somebody who doesn't know his own heart, do you? You'll find someone who's brave enough to love you. Someday. One day. Not today.

Conservation viewed in its entirety, is the slow and laborious unfolding of a new relationship between people and land.

One must not look inward too much, while the inside is yet tender. I do not wish to frighten myself until I can stand it.

Make every day special. Own it. Enjoy it. Bask in the glory of life. Appreciate the gift of your own life.

Prayer, like faith, obtains promises, enlarges their operation, and adds to the measure of their results.

Islam is under obligation to gain power over all nations.

An army is a diversion of energy from the productive life of a nation.

Unhappiness is selfish, grief is selfish. For whom are the tears?

You can't live in the past, there's nothing you can do about it.

I like talking to a brick wall- it's the only thing in the world that never contradicts me!

This is my life, and I want to live it and enjoy it if I can.