That was the way things worked. When you were looking for the big fight, the moment that you thought would knock everything over, nothing much happened at all.

Just because things hadn't gone the way I had planned didn't necessarily mean they had gone wrong.

I can't write the book I want to write, but I can and will write the book I am capable of writing.

Part of it is living in Tennessee. I'm so out of the loop. And as a person, I'm out of the loop. I'm oblivious by nature.

I was very influenced by The Magic Mountain. It's a book that had a huge impact on me. I loved that as a shape for a novel: put a bunch of people in a beautiful place, give them all tuberculosis, make them all stay in a fur sleeping bag for several years and see what happens.

I will go and speak at rotary clubs. I will go and speak at schools. I'm so much in the community, but in a way that I love. It's been such a positive thing.

You can't be a jerk in order to be a good writer.