"Pachinko” is the novel I tell anyone who will listen about. It is a multigenerational, sweeping saga of Koreans in Japan. The prose is as edifying as it is absorbing. There are no easy, convenient endings for any of these characters but my goodness, how richly Min Jin Lee renders their lives."

"Oh, how beautifully confusing this novel is. Heller, a war veteran himself, creates a cast full of colorful characters and antagonists to illustrate the insane bureaucracy of the war machine. A perfect compatriot to “Slaughter House 5,” revealing that we all may have a little Yossarian and Billy Pilgram in our personalities."

"So I have to think of one more? Okay, I’ll say that on the plane coming here I saw The Reader and I thought that was an amazing film, a very affecting film dealing with an almost overfamiliar subject but in an almost novel and emotional way. That’s my current favorite movie."

"When I was asked by my publisher to write a novel in their new series of novels based on Shakespeare-plays, I said yes, if I can have “Macbeth.” Why? Because it’s bloody. And short. And quite good. I don’t know if it was because of that answer, but they gave me “Macbeth.”"