Quotes from Tayari Jones

This is what I have come to know: Our past is never passed and there is no such thing as moving on. But there is this telling and there is such a thing as passing through.

Adolescence is a modern construct and very American in so many ways.

I like straightforward names for my characters. When I get too symbolic with names or places, I start feeling like the characters and the story are less read, and I lose interest.

Secret families are really the bedrock issue of Western literature.

I take mentoring very seriously and I am on the board of an organization called Girls Write Now, where we match teen girls and writing mentors because it changes their lives.

The adolescent protagonist is one of the hallmarks of American literature.

If there was ever a time to boil up some grits it is now.

When I am writing a story it feels as real as the life I am experiencing off the page. It's an emotional illusion, I guess.

Dwelling on pain, spending too much time immersed in it, tasting its flavors, fingering its textures--this makes it only more potent.

I do have a sister - I have two sisters.

I was kind of an invisible girl when I was young.

When it comes to memoir, we want to catch the author in a lie. When we read fiction, we want to catch the author telling the truth.

I take mentoring very seriously and I am on the board of an organization called Girls Write Now, where we match teen girls and writing mentors because it changes their lives.

Much of life is timing and circumstance, I see that now.

But how you feel love and understand love are two different things.

Is it love, or is it convenience?... She explained that connivence, habit, comfort, obligation- these are all things that wear the same clothing as love sometimes.

Sometimes when you like where you end up, you don't care how you got there.

There are too many loose ends in the world in need of knots.

One is the left shoe and the other is the right. They are the same but not interchangeable.

I don't believe that blood makes a family; kin is the circle you create, hands held tight.

You can never really unlove somebody. Maybe it changes shape, but it's there.

Marriage is between two people. There is no studio audience.

A marriage is more than your heart, it's your life. And we are not sharing ours.

It was a wonderful feeling to be grown and yet young. To be married but not settled. To be tied down yet free.