Why did I become a writer? Because I grew up in New York City, and there were seven newspapers in New York City, and my family was an inveterate reader of newspapers and I loved holding a paper in my hand. It was something sacred.

I think the only safe medium are books, because people like to hold books in their hand.

Teams are made up of a lot of components. They're made up of hunger, they're made up of desire, they're made up of chemistry, and they're made up of emotion.

I always had a curiosity about Texas. I had a curiosity about small-town life, although, granted, Odessa's not a tiny town.

Athletics: it's a wonderful thing, it's a spell-binding thing, nothing in life has quite as much pageantry, as much emotion within a finite time frame, it's incredibly exciting.

I don't have many friends in Philadelphia. I sort of have one. I have the dog and someone else.

I think a lot of parents are afraid to express certain emotions about children who are different, because they think that it's wrong to feel chained sometimes, to feel anger, to say to yourself, "I never wanted this." I think it's natural.