A sport has its own built-in integrity - doesn't need an artificial one.

What I hope my writing reflects... is a sense of the connections between all human beings... and a different perspective on the true nature of courage. For me, those are things worth exploring and writing about.

My first book, 'Running Loose', was censored back in 1983 or '84. Every book I've written since has been censored somewhere.

Whale Talk' is a tough book, but it is also a compassionate book about telling the truth and about redemption. I didn't draw the tough parts out of thin air; they are stories handed to me by people in pain.

Grief is sort of the allowance of feeling.

The reason I'm not more political is because I have music. And from a young age, I needed it. After prison, my father came to America, joined the Army, fought in Vietnam - and was exposed to Agent Orange. He died a slow, horrible death. Music was my escape.

The New Zealand sense of humor is tough and realistic. Jokes are not surreal; they are about life and death and tough decisions.

Ever since childhood, when I found out that the ultimate fate for all humans was death, sheer terror and morbid curiosity had been fighting for supremacy in my mind.