I find that I get very excited about what my students are up to and that I get to be the hurdle they need to jump over.

Maybe we're stuck with who we are.

Truly things are better in general now, in America, than in the past.

Sometimes people want to know how to write a story from the point of view of a murderer and make her sympathetic. I think the answer is that you start by having her look for her car keys, because everybody knows what it's like.

I find that I get very excited about what my students are up to and that I get to be the hurdle they need to jump over.

I get to a certain point, and I think in a novel it's about the third draft, when I want other eyes on it.

I don't think a white person can write accurately and convincingly about what black people experience of oppression.