I would get up at 3 in the morning and write. Or sometimes I would write at midnight. Or I would write when my child napped. It wasn't a burden. I was so enthused about what I was doing at the time that I really didn't mind.

I have to entertain, because if I don't entertain you, you're not going to continue reading. But if I'm not out to enlighten, or change your mind about something, or change your behavior, then I really don't want to take the journey.

African-Americans know about racism, but I don't think we really know the causes. I decided it's first of all a family problem.

When you go on book tour, you're always talking about yourself and your book from the time you get up in the morning until you go out at night. You, you. You get really sick of yourself.

Directing is: you're overwhelmed the whole time. Your mind never stops. If you care about it. You wake up in the morning and you begin thinking about it and then you go to sleep at night and you're still thinking about it.

I had an agent who spent eight years - eight years! - trying to sell my stories. She sold other people's work; she just didn't sell mine.