You know how sometimes you meet writers that are so full of themselves? They feel really proud that they wrote something . But what they don't understand - and I like to tell this to writers - is that writing is like fishing. It's just like fishing. If you don't fish that often, you're not going to catch that many fish.

The stories are what no one wants to talk about. So you make up a story because no one is going to tell you the truth.

I know the books that I need to help me to be wiser than my years and be kinder and more compassionate and more patient than I really am.

I'm just as unhappy about San Antonio as I was about Chicago. If you're unhappy about certain things, you're unhappy everywhere.

The ego's blocking the light from coming.

If you know two cultures and two languages, that intermediate place, where the two don't perfectly meet, is really interesting.

The Mexico - United States border was always porous. People have been going and coming back since before the Spaniards arrived. Now we're seeing communities who have family members on the other side very frightened. I feel saddened for those families divided by violence. The whole border area is under siege.