I have lived long enough and seen enough to recognize that there are many dark currents in the human psyche, which persist in spite of the works of God and man; they resurface at times...

Conchpore is real. It is as real as Malgudi, Brahmpur, Lilliput or Macondo. And also as real as San Francisco, Madurai, Edinburgh, Gaborone or Tokyo. You know that fictional towns exist. You visit them all...

The world of a cat is unlike any other. What is seen through their eyes cannot be understood by anyone besides another cat. Their world is filled with secrets and adventures that are always present...

To write is to reveal oneself.When I write something, fiction or non-fiction, I do not expect you to accept what I write, nor to agree with what I propose.I expect you to spend at least...

When I label something as fiction, people say it’s true, and when I label something as non-fiction, people say it is made up. If something is not 100% true, then I label it as fiction....

There used to be a rubbish heap under the great tree in Dhoby Ghaut with a sarabat stall parked next to it. It was a low, sprawling rubbish heap made up of the usual things—refuse...

If the weight comes from bacon you can so deduct it off the scale total to get your true weight. #science

The sun does not abandon the moon to darkness.

…every harsh word spoken, every such act or even thought doesn’t just disappear – it hangs around somewhere in totality and some day it boomerangs to haunt us.

It is through hearing stories about wicked stepmothers, lost children, good but misguided kings, wolves that suckle twin boys, youngest sons who receive no inheritance but must make their own way in the world, and...

I enjoy writing fiction more than writing anything else. Wouldn’t anyone?

Fiction though it is a fiction, should be written in a way that it feels like a reality, a reality every reader willingly or sometimes unwillingly goes through, until the reader finishes reading and sometimes...

Some books must be sipped slowly like a strong bourbon. Most books must be devoured more than once because as you age you distill more.

Then he was there, turned half toward her with a guarded expression etched across his face. She didn’t stop or even slow her step. When she reached him, she grabbed the front of his shirt...

When the gap between the world of the city and the world my grandfather had presented to me as right and good became too wide and depressing to tolerate, I’d turn to my other great...

Life is about trusting your feelings and taking chances, losing and finding happiness, appreciating the memories, learning from the past, and realizing people change.

Writing is just building a new world – one character, one place, one maniac at a time.

Hey, I write fiction. I just make this stuff up, unless I get my hands on some good juicy truth. You know the kind I’m talking about … that stranger-than variety.

Philippe to his mother “do stop chasing after a carriage that has a runaway mare.

Grandpa said that we could solve a lot of the world’s problems if we considered cats and dogs edible. Like the neighbor’s dog who goes to the bathroom in his flower garden. And know what...

Before the autumn of our years, there exists a time when we struggle to reconcile what we are with what we wish to be. This time can be known as summer. After spring gives us...

Art, though, is never the voice of a country; it is an even more precious thing, the voice of the individual, doing its best to speak, not comfort of any sort, but truth. And the...

…and I wondered, not for the first time, if some of life’s tragedy arose when people put themselves in situations they were not by nature suited for.

If you focus your eyes towards the horizon, everything and everyone walking in front of you becomes a blurry mass. That’s what everyone else became. All of their dark wool suits began to mesh into...

Fiction is one of the few experiences where loneliness can be both confronted and relieved. Drugs, movies where stuff blows up, loud parties — all these chase away loneliness by making me forget my name’s...

If we truly detach from our childhood and abandon our inherent romanticism, then we shred any bit of humanity left in us.

Once out of the mailroom, I began to learn more about fear. As soonas fear begins to ascend, anatomically, from the pit of the stomach to thethroat and brain, from fear of violence to the...

No amount of fire or freshness can challenge what a man will store up in his ghostly heart.

In 1936, I first wrote science fiction. It was a long-winded attempt at writing an endless novel…which died. I remember one sentence, “Whole forests stood sere and brown in midsummer”.

How does evil arise? Where does it come from? We think of malevolent men-— murderers, rapists, tyrants—and somehow believe they are different creatures from us. They are not. All evil men were once innocent babes,...

A romance book is designed to tell you something about love–its ability to endure, forgive, go the extra mile, care about someone, put someone else first.

I could have drowned…and my brother didn’t even care.

My name’s Sean, Jem. I’m Sean.

Your heart is like a great river after a long spell of rain, spilling over its banks. All signposts that once stood on the ground are gone, inundated and carried away by that rush of...

Going for it and changing what you could change-that’s what success was all about.

I liked reading biographies of writers, even if (as was the case with Monsieur Rabelais)I’d never read any of their actual writing. I flipped to the back and found the highlighted quote (“NEVER USE A...

It was a time before Facebook and Instagram and texting. I imagine it must be easier now, for college students. Home must not feel so far away anymore. But how do you cut the apron...

Six nervous wives at the sink, each quiet as a queen on a chessboard.

I was so enthused with literature — not stuck on literature, but in love with letters — that I was easily inclined to bring all the conversations round to works I had read or fictitious...

Kadang aku merasa jatuh cinta kepadanya seperti bernapas—terlalu mudah. Sangat mudah sampai-sampai aku tidak menyadarinya.

A time will come in your life, William, where your faith will be tested… and you must stay faithful to the word and vision that the All-Father has given to you.

I would never attempt to dissuade anyone from reading a book. But please, if you’re reading something that’s killing you, put it down and read something else, just as you would reach for the remote...

A new age dawns, Uttara. The Wheel of Time has turned. Not too long from now – hopefully in our lifetime – Aryavarta will be a janapada, a realm ruled by its people, the largest...

(From the Author Note at the beginning of the book.) Dorothy L. Sayers used to say that mystery stories were the only moral fiction of the modern world–because in a mystery, you were guaranteed to...

Underwater, bubbles erupted before my eyes as a swift hand snatched my arm and pulled me to the surface. I gasped for air, coughing and gagging at the amount of water I sucked into my...

To see someone you love in so much pain—especially emotional pain that can’t be remedied—was the worst form of torture.

Fiction reveals truths that reality obscures.

I’m angry with myself.

Writing fiction is the act of weaving a series of lies to arrive at a greater truth.

In life your rewards come from the gifts you give to others.