In The 1980s, When People Were Just

That Experience Of Touching Down In A Totally Foreign Place Is Like Having A Blank Canvas: You Begin With Nothing, But Stroke By Stroke You Build A Life. This Process Requires Everything Great Art Requires-risk-tasking, Hope, A Great Deal Of Imagination, All The Qualities That Are The Building Blocks Of Art. You Must Be Able To Dream Something Nearly Impossible And Toil To Bring It Into Existence.

When You Write ,it's Like Braiding Your Hair. Taking A Handful Of Coarse Unruly Strands And Attempting To Bring Then Unity.

Salt Is A Powerful Symbol In Haiti, As Elsewhere. Salt Of The Earth, For Example Is An American Phrase. In Haiti, Myth And Legend Has It That If You Are Turned Into A Zombie, If Someone Gives You A Taste Of Salt, Then You Can Come Back To Life. And In The Life Of The Fishermen, There Are So Many Little Things About Salt That I Wanted To Incorporate. The Salt In The Air. The Crackling Of Salt In The Fire. There's All This Damage, This Peeling Of The Fishing Boats From The Sea Salt. But There Is Also Healing From It, Sea Baths That Are Supposed To Heal All Kinds Of Aches And Wounds.

The Girl She Said, I Didn’t Tell You This Because It Was A Small Thing, But Little Girls, They Leave Their Hearts At Home When They Walk Outside. Hearts Are So Precious. They Don’t Want To Lose Them.

I Think It's Hard To Write A Book About Happiness Because Fiction Requires Tension And Complication.