It was too vast a problem to be just a personal thing. There should be some help, someone should tell them before it was too late. Someone should tell their side of the story, and maybe people would understand then, and wouldn’t be so quick to judge a boy by the amount of hair oil he wore.

You take up for your buddies, no matter what they do. When you're a gang, you stick up for the members. If you don't stick up for them, stick together, make like brothers, it isn't a gang anymore. It's a pack. A snarling, distrustful, bickering park like the Socs in their social clubs or the street gangs in New York or the wolves in the timber.

the person in this picture is really me.

I used to be sure of things. Me, once i had all the answers. I wish i was a kid again, when i had all the answers

I really do like listening to stuff that's happened to other people. I guess that's why I like to read.

Anything you read can influence your work, so I try to read good stuff.

All my life I wanted somebody who knew more than I did to tell me the truth.