I would like to believe that most people, regardless of gender, are good and kind. The good men in my stories are the rule. It's the bad men that are the exception and because I tend toward the dark in my fiction, you see more of the exception than the rule.

I never imagined that I would be the kind of person who is recognized when I am out and about just living my life.

The designation is useful and necessary and sometimes limiting but it is only limiting to people who think, for example, that African-American literature couldn't possibly be something they could be interested in or relate to. They have limited imaginations, which is sad.

What is it like to be connected to someone you can never get away from, for better or worse? I love trying to answer that question.

People of color are not under any kind of obligation beyond working hard, doing their best, and learning from their mistakes.

Sex offers incredible narrative opportunities and so many emotions are tied up in sex. Also, I mean, the erotic is always a fun creative space.

I thought a lot about how so many memoirs about fatness focus on weight loss; they don't focus on living with weight in a world that is rather inhospitable to it. So I knew that was the idea that was going to be most interesting and most challenging, and I like to be challenged as a writer.