In this age when reality is built on big lies, what better place for truth than fiction?

I was participating in something horrible, and my only defense is that I was motivated by my own fear, which of course is no defense at all.

Forgiveness comes later in life, after you’ve created enough disasters of your own.

People look at interracial couples through their own, distorting racial lens. It doesn’t matter what form they take.

I’m really suspicious of anybody who comes in and says, this is your identity now, or this is your belief system, and now that you have this, everything’s going to be great.

Even drunk, I knew any escape plan that involved going to Detroit, Michigan, was a harbinger of doom.

My strong suit is that I’ve been willing to risk on the page to get somewhere interesting.

It is a great moment in every freak’s life when he or she finds out that at least they are not the only one.

My weak suit is whatever each reader hates about each book.

I have found that, in the African American oral tradition, if the words are enunciated eloquently enough, no one examines the meaning for definitive truth.