I live in a blue-collar neighborhood, and if anyone knows what I do for a living, they don't seem to care.

The thirst for knowledge is like a piece of ass you know you shouldn't chase; in the end, you chase it just the same.

We couldn't have known - who could've predicted what happened in American politics in the 2016? The rise of racism again, or the peeling back of the onion and seeing racism again, was a bit of a surprise in the last couple years.

I'm proud to be a crime novelist. What I've chosen is the best way to convey the questions I'm trying to raise.

Any time you have poverty, joblessness, sub-par public schools, and a lack of opportunity, you're going to have a high rate of crime.

I don't believe that murders can be "solved." I think that this is the big lie of the mystery novel, that you should close the book and feel that the world is back in order and everything's all right. I want the reader to know that the world is not all right, and maybe we ought to do something about it.

The crime part is the engine that moves the narrative and allows me to write the other things I want to write about.