The world should always be concerned whenever a vast human rights violation occurs anywhere on the planet.

I think men spend so much time passing for being men. There's a sense among many writers of color that the most invisible figure that was sitting between all of us was the nerd. But it was the thing we weren't saying, that people were afraid to say, like, "Yo, what we do is nerdy by definition."

I never wanted to be away from the family. Intuitively, I knew how easily distances could harden and become permanent.

She's sensitive, too. Takes to hurt the way water takes to paper.

As artists we are here to make you uncomfortable with the complexity of your reality.

In my mind what novels do best is that they immerse us deeply into our character's world - they truly transport us deep into these spaces - but the same way you know a Hollywood movie won't end after thirty minutes, you carry in yourself the implicit contract that the novel won't throw you out of itself 'til the very end. That bulk of pages is a form of consolation, of security.

I sat down next to her. Took her hand. This can work, I said. All we have to do is try.