How do you defeat terrorism? Don’t be terrorized.

Science fiction is where I started out, really. When I was a kid, I was a complete addict of science fiction. It was one of my earliest interests as a writer, and I've just taken a long time to circle back around to it.

I'm a big-city boy. What I like is big cities. It's not just what I like. It's what I write about.

Human beings, you see, do absolutely two primary things. We see like and unlike. Like becomes, in literature, simile and metaphor. Unlike becomes uniqueness and difference, from which I believe, the novel is born.

If you're going to write a memoir, try to be as honest and open as you can.

The suicide bomber's imagination leads him to believe in a brilliant act of heroism, when in fact he is simply blowing himself up pointlessly and taking other people's lives.

I've never yet managed to write a novel which didn't have an Indian central character.