The gift of literature is that, in some lucky cases, reading a novel or a story makes the reader more curious, more open-minded.

Universally, not only in Israel, people want to feel good about themselves. We all want to feel good to some extent.

Don't write about that which you don't know.

I would love to leave my children and grandchildren a nicer world than the one I am going to leave them. But bearing in mind that I was born in the world of Hitler, Mussolini and Franco, the legacy I leave them might not be as terrible as the legacy my parents and grandparents left to me.

But for 30 years, Orthodox leaders have tipped the balance between hawks and doves, and have been in a position to determine who forms a coalition and who runs the country.

The place of my novels is Israel, almost without exception. All of them take place in Israel - in Jerusalem, in the desert, in the kibbutz, in small towns, in villages.

Things can be translated, but they become different.