We've lost our sense of ethics; we live in a world of small-mindedness, of gratification without happiness and actions without meaning.

When my daughter Paula died, I was in the deepest pain, and my mother said, "This kind of sorrow is like a long, narrow, dark channel. You have to walk this channel alone and be sure that there is light at the other ending. Just keep walking."

The writer of good will carries a lamp to illuminate the dark corners.

In my book tours I get to meet an audience every night. And I see that there are mostly young people, and there are a lot of more men than before, but always young, I don't get older men. As I'm getting older, my audience gets younger!

Heroism is a badly remunerated occupation, and often it leads to an early end, which is why it appeals to fanatics or persons with an unhealthy fascination with death.

I'm an expert. I can kill anybody and not be caught.

Now of course we have Black historians, but they're usually men. We get the perspective always, the slanted perspective, of what has happened. The battles, the things achieved, the laws, but where are the people, the families? What happens inside the houses, inside the minds and the hearts? That's what I'm interested in.