Love and prayer are intimately related.

If you only write for 15 minutes at a time, you can write a book and still have time for Legos.

I honestly never intended food to occupy so much of my creative work. Food-writing often seems about to plummet straight into sentimentality. I think food can be dangerous to write about because if you don't manage to mediate it somehow, it can be the worst sort of greeting card.

I heard friends and strangers saying, "You don't look Arab - what are you supposed to be?" It really is a tired old problem for children of immigrants and kids of mixed race, constantly trying to explain yourself. Eventually, you give up and say, "Okay, what do you think I am?" When you're in the midst of it, you come to understand that "race" is a loose social construct, a series of visual impressions, and that your identity can be whatever the hell crazy thing you want it to be, you just have to grow a sense of humor and cultivate selective deafness.

Cultural identity is of course connected to this issue. When I was younger, it was inspiring to write about the people that raised me, especially their near-insane struggle to live between America and Middle East. But like many writers, I want to paint on as broad a canvas as possible.

Love and prayer are intimately related.

If you silence yourself, if you try to be good, if you try to be polite, or toe a party line, you end up paying for that in the long run. You pay for it... with your homeland, or with your soul, or with your artistic vision.