I took up writing to escape the drudgery of that every day cubicle kind of war.

The police and I have a deal. I don't talk to them and they don't listen to me.

One of the things that I love about being a writer is this. I wake up every day and I write for three hours. I wake up early. So like 6:00, 7:00 in the morning, I write till 9:00 or 10:00. I live in New York, nobody even is breathing until 9:00 or 10:00 in the morning. So, it's like my writing life is completely removed from the rest of my life.

Your book grows. The early part of your book is growing still while you are writing the later part of your book.

Black men of our day were never told, The sky's the limit. ... We could aspire to Joe Louis but never Henry Ford.

At one time if you were a black writer you had to be one of the best writers in the world to be published. You had to be great. Now you can be good. Mediocre. And that's good.

I would have been completely brainwashed by this lopsided and racist view of the world if it weren't for my father. He was a deep thinker and an irrepressible problem solver. He was a Black Socrates, asking why and then spoiling ready-made replies.