The first books I was interested in were all about baseball. But I can't think of one single book that changed my life in any way.

I didn't like the competitiveness of big-time journalism.

It takes an earthquake to remind us that we walk on the crust of an unfinished planet.

You can't travel the back roads very long without discovering a multitude of gentle people doing good for others with no expectation of gain or recognition. The everyday kindness of the back roads more than makes up for the acts of greed in the headlines. Some people out there spend their whole lives selflessly.

I remember being in the public library and my jaw just aching as I looked around at all those books I wanted to read. There just wasn't time enough to read everything I wanted to read.

If there are bleachers in heaven and a warm sun, that's where you'll find Bill Veeck.

I have spent a good part of my life looking for the perfect barbecue. There is no point in looking in places like Texas, where they put some kind of ketchup on beef and call it barbecue. Barbecue is pork, which narrows the search to the South, and if it's really good pork barbecue you are looking for, to North Carolina.