It's not getting from A to B. It's not the beginning or the destination that counts. It's the ride in between...This train is alive with things that should be seen and heard. It's a living, breathing something -- you just have to want to learn its rhythm.

The human spirit was the strongest medicine on earth. And sometimes all it needed was a little encouragement to pull off a miracle.

When a poor man gives something, that is a sacrifice indeed. When a rich man gives something, it hardly rises to the same level.

The military is a very cool world to write about. I went down to Ft. Benning, Ga., for military training, and I learned a lot about soldiers and officers and why they joined up and what their life has been like.

It's my experience that most folk who ride trains could care less where they're going. For them it's the journey itself and the people they meet along the way. You see, at every stop this train makes, a little bit of America, a little bit of your country, gets on and says hello.

But protagonists are protagonists and heroes are heroes.

People have given me classified information, but always with the disclaimer 'This can never end up in a book.' And it never does.