If I had simply wanted to trade on an insult to Islam, I could have done it in a sentence rather than writing a 250,000-word novel, a work of fiction.

I am certainly not a good Muslim. But I am able now to say that I am Muslim; in fact it is a source of happiness to say that I am now inside, and a part of the community whose values have always been closest to my heart.

I've always thought that one of the things that the Internet and the gaming world permits as a narrative technique is to not tell the story from beginning to end - to tell stories sideways, to give alternative possibilities that the reader can, in a way, choose between.

I learned: the first lesson of my life: nobody can face the world with his eyes open all the time.

Don't you know girls have to fool people every day of their lives if they want to get anywhere?

Vertigo is the conflict between the fear of falling and the desire to fall.

I grew up kissing books and bread.