And also I think the rise of other, you could say, destinations for international jihadis mean that Pakistan isn't necessarily the place where people from all over the world who want to engage in these activities gravitate to. They're going now to places like Syria or Yemen Libya, elsewhere.

In a way, every parent is sort of dependent on the benevolence of the society around them to take care of their children.

There's a reason prophets perform miracles; language lacks the power to describe faith.

I did not grow up in poverty. But I did grow up with a poor boy's sense of longing, in my case not for what my family had never had, but for what we had had and lost.

I think fiction allows you to inhabit new domains and it's you, the reader living in that domain for a few days that results in a deeper understanding as opposed to the novel proclaiming this is what it is right and this is what is wrong.

I think the most effective forms of critique are ones that establish a common ground for people to occupy, and then appeal to the best nature of people on that common ground.

Why the brevity? Because I'd rather people read my book twice than only half-way through