Ricky had taught me a few cuss words. I usually practiced them in the woods by the river, then prayed for forgiveness as soon as I was done.

In life, finding a voice is speaking and living the truth. Each of you is an original. Each of you has a distinctive voice. When you find it, your story will be told. You will be heard.

One thing you really have to watch as a writer is getting on a soapbox or pulpit about anything. You don't want to alienate readers.

You live your life today, Not tommorow, and certainly not yesterday.

Prisons are fascinating places, especially when the inmates are educated white-collar types.

Jesus preached more and taught more about helping the poor and the sick and the hungry than he did about heaven and hell. Shouldn't that tell us something?

When witnesses concoct lies, they often miss the obvious.

If you're gonna be stupid you gotta be tough.

When you work at street level you never know who's going to walk through your door.

Shame was an emotion he had abandoned years earlier. Addicts know no shame. You disgrace yourself so many times you become immune to it.

judge not that ye be not judged

Confront the page that taunts you with its whiteness. Face your enemy and fill it with words. You are bigger and stronger than a piece of paper.

I'm always rather nervous about how you talk about women who are active in politics, whether they want to be talked about as women or as politicians.

The principle can be established that for a man who does not cheat what he believes to be true must determine his actions.

Well Terry, can you tell us where you are in the league, how far are you ahead of the second team?

It's time for Black people to stop playing the separating game of geography, of where the slave ship put us down. We must concentrate on where the slave ship picked us up.

I use very few muscles at the best of times.

I'm the only person in the entire world who has never see 'Dawson's Creek.

The interesting part is, that being the United States Secretary of State, most places I went didn't have a problem with me being a woman, because I was representing the United States.

It's better not to see than to see wrongly.

Health is just not valued until illness comes.