"What Kafka gave Marquez —permission to write — Shame did for me. And like all electrifying experiences, at first it was just the shock that such things could be done with novels, that got to me."

"Beautiful and hard-working black people come in all shades. If dark people have less it is not because they are less, a moral eloquently conveyed in these two classic novels, stirring explorations of colorism."

"Say Nothing is written like the most gripping of novels. Patrick Radden Keefe brings the tragedies of The Troubles in Northern Ireland to life in this brilliant piece of investigative writing. Heartbreaking, eloquent, shattering, lingering, illuminating."

"Dawn Powell’s diaries would place me in NYC no matter how remote this desert island is. Images, ideas, perfectly parceled out, brief, heartbreaking observations, a kind of urbane wisdom, even if you don’t like her novels."

"I read it in my teens and it hooked me on mysterious China! I love novels about China and its history and culture, especially the story of women; so complex and colorful, and often so twisted, too."