I would not describe myself as a political writer except in the sense that the personal is political, which is something that I do strongly believe. And in that sense American Gods is a very personal novel and a political novel. I was trying to describe the experience of coming to America as an immigrant, the experience of watching the way that America tends to eat other cultures.

The search for the word gets no easier but nobody else is going to write your novel for you.

I was a stranger and you took me in. -Joji G. Shoji, d. 1921

Something feels weird," he told Laura. That wasn't the first thing he said to her. The first thing was "I love you," because it's a good thing to say if you can mean it, and Shadow did.

I hope you'll make mistakes. If you're making mistakes, it means you're out there doing something.

Look. I brought you here to give you a choice-" "You didn't bring us here," said Nick. "You're here," said Bod. "I wanted you here. I came here. You followed me. Same thing.

My bed was pushed up hard against the wall just below the window. I loved to sleep with the windows open. Rainy nights were the best of all: I would open my windows and put my head on my pillow and close my eyes and feel the wind on my face and listen to the trees sway and creak. There would be raindrops blown onto my face, too, if I was lucky, and I would imagine that I was in my boat on the ocean and that it was swaying with the swell of the sea. I did not imagine that I was a pirate, or that I was going anywhere. I was just on my boat.