The Bowery station on the J line is what happens to a neighborhood once politicians realize the people who live there don’t vote.

If I ever stopped being angry, I couldn’t write anymore. How could I?

Journalism is the protection between people and any sort of totalitarian rule. That’s why my hero, admittedly a flawed one, is a journalist.

The more bullets flying, the less accurate each individual slug has to be.

Be he the first to stand or the last, a man must stand,” the father had told his adoring son. “And if there is only one man, then that man must stand alone.” ~Thomas to...

Without question, I’ve either got to be a writer, or I fail.

Life is a fight, but not everyone’s a fighter. Otherwise, bullies would be an endangered species.

My life is triage.

The idea that you’re not a writer until you’re published is a lie.

The idea that you are a writer because you’re published is also a lie.

You want proof evolution is for real, don’t waste your time with fossils; just check out the New York City rat. They started out as immigrants, stowaways in some ship’s cargo hold. Only the survivors...

I believe my publisher has shown a great deal of faith in me over a lot of years but I’m not prepared to be so arrogant to say that the long-term literary value of my...

Fighting means you could lose. Bullying means you can’t. A bully wants to beat somebody; he doesn’t want to fight somebody.

My stuff isn’t for everyone.

I think people should be consumers of journalism.

From the very second that two people sat together around a fire in the forest, there was another human out there who felt better in the dark.

I did criminal defense work part-time, and that paid the bills for representing abused and neglected children… and for defending in juvenile court those kids the ‘child protective system’ had missed when it had the...

All children are born pure egoists. They perceive their needs to the exclusion of all others. Only through socialization do they learn that some forms of gratification must be deferred and others denied.

Ours is a country where anything can be accomplished if enough people get angry… because, in America, we act on our collective anger.

I want to disabuse people of the idea that knowledge is power. Knowing how to get to Detroit is not the same thing as having the bus fare.

People are pushing against the fabric of society all the time.

People who don’t have much get ugly about giving up the little they have left.

The sweetest thing I could say about my mother and father is that if I had the choice, I would have picked them. But I don’t have any belief in biology or DNA as compelling...

A kid in an abusive home has far fewer rights than any POW. There is no Geneva Convention for kids.

While early childhood experiences may impel, they do not compel. In the end, evil is a matter of choice.

Fear is an enemy that can be killed only at close range. The closest range of all is intimacy. The deeper the fear is embedded in one’s spirit, the more vulnerable it is.

The third person narrator, instead of being omniscient, is like a constantly running surveillance tape.

Stealing to eat ain’t criminal—stealing to be rich is.

No politician is threatened by the child protective constituency, because it does not exist.

I don’t understand people whose gratification is a BMW. You don’t know what joy is until you see a kid who was tortured get adopted by a family.

Anyone who says, ‘Books don’t change anything,’ or – more commonly – that crime fiction is the wrong genre for promoting social change – should take a closer look.

If a train is coming at you, closing your eyes won’t save you … but if you look right at it, you at least have a chance to jump.

Ask any experienced defense lawyer: the real risks are for an accused person who is innocent. A guilty defendant has many more options available.

Most investigators don’t even know what the word means. You stop the cops from using informants and the only crimes they’d ever solve would be those by deranged postal workers who come to work once...

A trial is not a search for truth. It is a contest and, often, one that produces no winners.

We don’t protect our young, and we tolerate predators of our own species.

I don’t even use italics or boldface; that’s clutter, not clarity. Fancy fonts are fine for blogs, just as calligraphy is fine for diaries. But when you’re writing for anyone other than yourself, you want...

Camouflage doesn’t help when the other guy is willing to defoliate the whole jungle.

Courier 12 is the Type-O blood of fonts – works just as good for a ‘N.Y. Times’ op-ed as a screenplay or a short story.

Cats are the lap-dancers of the animal world. Soon as you stop shelling out, they move on, find another lap. They’re furry little sociopaths. Pretty and slick — in love with themselves. When’s the last...

I didn’t start out angry. I started out a young man wanting adventure.

Building a mechanical device for its appearance is like putting lace on a bowling ball.

That’s Manhattan today—all the money goes up top, while the infrastructure wastes away from neglect. The famous skyline is a cheap trick now, a sleight-of-hand to draw your eye from the truth, as illusory as...

A couple of buffoons were running for some state-senate seat just vacated by the incumbent’s prison term. One accused the other of being “against the Internet” – a knockout punch in a world where whole...

Crime takes the pulse of a culture. It tells us the truth about us as a species.

He said when the Lord made people He made them all the same for starters. But life marks people. If you know the way, you can read them like maps.

I don’t sign contracts for my books.

I’m in pursuit of what cannot be achieved: perfection.

If love would die along with death, this life wouldn’t be so hard.

It’s the family you choose that counts.