Write about the thing that scares you most or your most private confession and you'll never have a problem coming up with decent fiction.

It's my belief that people enter your life at exactly the right time.

But people in a small town tend to do a lot of talking, even when they don’t know what they’re talking about.

Nothing says work efficiency like panic mode.

The recipe for great art has always been misery and a good bowel movement.

A day of bad writing is always better than a day of no writing.

Any conversation including the mention of Roald Dahl, Ray Bradbury, or Emily Dickinson is one worth getting into or at least eavesdropping.

Nothing's a better cure for writer's block than to eat ice cream right out of the carton.

A writer always writes.

Always mystify, torture, mislead, and surprise the audience as much as possible.

If you treat your characters like people, they'll reward you by being fully developed individuals.

Mother can beat me all she wants, but I haven’t let her take away my will to somehow survive.

I am living. I am a miracle. Everyday of my life is miraculous!

Some presters might tell you never to question, but that is tantamount to telling you not to think. Odun created us to explore, to experience. There is no harm in asking questions…

You see, the interesting thing about books, as opposed, say, to films, is that it's always just one person encountering the book, it's not an audience, it's one to one.

Stop thinking about global warming as a future threat and understand it instead as a present emergency, one that requires a far stronger policy response than we'd imagined.

I can't think of any other job in journalism where the newsmakers come to you.

I try personally not to be nostalgic.

Be true. Be beautiful. Be free. In the midst of segregation and racism Mamma raised us to be independent and free. We saw ourselves as citizens of the world, not of a block.

I don't accept armed struggle. Maybe it was the way in the '50s and '60s, but we want a democratic revolution.

My opinion is that the only two computer companies that are software-driven are Apple and NeXT, and I wonder about Apple.