Barrabas came to us by sea, the child Clara wrote in her delicate calligraphy.

Music is a wind that blows away the years, memories, and fear, that crouching animal I carry inside me.

More and more books are published every year. If people were not reading them, they wouldn't be published. We are in a different moment. We are now reading electronic books or whatever else, but people are still reading, and people still need stories.

My female protagonist will not be this promiscuous, beautiful, dark-haired, thin lady. It will be a plump, blond, healer and so forth.

Aphrodite is about lust and gluttony - the only two sins worth committing, in my opinion.

I'm very optimistic because I think that the real strength of a nation like the United States comes from blending cultures. There's no way that you can close the frontiers anywhere. The borders are there to be violated permanently.

In 2011, I announced that I was going to retire, and my agent panicked. So she says: No, no, no. You have to write a book with your husband.