I started publishing stories in small magazines early on, but after seven or eight or nine years you feel like you need a little more than that to show for your efforts.

It is sort of weird being honored for the worst day of your life.

I kept going back while I was writing the novel - which never sold, may it rest in peace - and by the time it was finished I had too many connections to Haiti to walk away.

I started publishing stories in small magazines early on, but after seven or eight or nine years you feel like you need a little more than that to show for your efforts.

I quit law in 1988 to start writing, and it took me 17 years from that point to get a book contract. I guess you can say I was on the slow train.

If a person wants to be of any use to himself, he better insist on getting his fair share of beauty and pleasure, and if there's something about the system that's keeping him from getting his share, then I think he's well within his rights to fight to change that.

Late bloomer' is another way of saying 'slow learner.