It's very important to distinguish between innocence and naivete. The innocent do not deserve to be the victims of violence. But only the naive refuse to think about the origins of violence and to pursue the possibility that the genesis of that hatred could be addressed.

What we end up calling history is a kind of knife, slicing down through time. A few people are hard enough to bend its edge. But most won't even stand close to the blade. I'm one of those. We don't bend anything.

We agreed with him in principal - we were little scientists, born and bred. But children robbed of love will dwell on magic.

A person could spend most of a lifetime in retrospective terror, thinking of all the things one nearly didn't do.

A sound-bite culture can't discuss science very well. Exactly what we're losing when we reduce biodiversity, the causes and consequences of global warming-these traumas can't be adequately summarized in an evening news wrap-up.

I live in a rural part of Virginia surrounded by farms and farmers.

It takes some courage to write fiction about politically controversial topics. The dread is you'll be labeled a political writer.