I get a very vague idea and - perhaps because I once was a journalist, or perhaps because that's what made me want to be a journalist - I go off and explore it for a bit, rather than mapping… — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
I was always at heart a novelist and wanted to tell a bigger story, so I wanted to create people who told other kinds of truths than literal truths. — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
What ultimately happened is that my country had a war. I think it would be extraordinary, as a writer, not to want to write… — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
“We became friends, I suppose, because we lived close to each other and it suited us and because when you are young friendships go… — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
“Adrian's tone suggested that the desire for something was all it took. They all live with endless possibilities, leave their homes for the sake… — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
No one ever sits you down at age eight and says, 'Aminatta, this is what's happened so far.' You have to work it out… — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
All liars ... lie to protect themselves, to shield their egos from the raw pain of truth. — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
“There's something uncomfortable about looking at pictures of your parents at a time when they made each other happy.” — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
I temporarily became a surgeon for 'Memory of Love'. I spent two weeks in an operating theatre, watching amputations, and I loved it. — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
“How easily they spoke of love. And yet, when she'd needed the certainty of his feeling for her, he'd let her slip away, never… — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
War had the effect of encouraging people to try to stay alive. Poverty, too. Survival was simply too hard-won to be given up lightly. — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
“He knows nothing about how this will all end, except that it will surely end. He tries to imagine himself into a future, somewhere… — Aminatta Forna Copy Share Image
