I have faith in human beings. I struggle with that faith.

She glances back before stepping into the alley, and she catches her grandfather looking at her the way he does sometimes--as if she's already gone, as if he's practicing sorrow.

I believe that one of the most damning things about our culture is the adage to never talk religion and politics. Because we don't model this discourse at the dinner table and at Thanksgiving, we don't know how to do it well and we're not teaching our children about the world and about how to discuss it.

I've never thought there was anything I could hope to get by praying for it.

You learn to exploit genre for the more important things - to my mind - like story, character, image, language.

Love is a luxury. It's something that people are allowed to indulge in when they're not simply trying to survive and keep other people alive.

I believe we're brutes, but then, miraculously, there are those among us who stand up against that brutishness and remind us of the goodness we're capable of.