“Biology gives you a brain. Life turns it into a mind.”

“There was nowhere I could go that wouldn't be you.”

“I think the suicides in my first book came from the idea of growing up in Detroit. If you grow up in a city like that you feel everything is perishing, evanescent and going away very quickly...”

“It was amazing how it worked: the tiniest bit of truth made credible the greatest lies.”

“But maybe they understood more about life than I did. From an early age they knew what little value the world placed in books, and so didn't waste their time with them. Whereas I, even now,...”