The military preferred - invariably - those who could be readily defined, assigned roles, understood, and controlled.

We must be what we are, or we become our enemies.

I have always argued, in a good novel, interesting things happen to interesting people.

It is always difficult, even with the best will in the world, to look back a long way and see anything resembling the truth.

You have to be afraid for it to count as bravery.

There are kinds of action, for good or ill, that lie so far outside the boundaries of normal behavior that they force us, in acknowledging that they have occurred, to restructure our own understanding of reality. We have to make room for them.

Writing is never, ever easy but I wake up every morning grateful for the gift of being able to do this.