Love and despair go hand in hand.

I always intended to be light and open. I misjudged the American audience.

Voice comes to you through a spell, a trance. The best voices are not you... they're a little away from you.

Children will listen to anything elders say to survive, and if you grew up without an elder telling you there was a god, what did your parents say to you?

I wake my wife up at 3 a.m. and say, "Listen to this!"

I'll tell you why I like writing: it's just jumping into a pool. I get myself into a kind of trance. I engage the world, but it's also wonderful to just escape. I try to find the purities out of the confusion. It's pretty old-fashioned, but it's fun.

I thought I was writing for a fairly hip, intelligent crowd; I just thought there were more of them out there. But they're not. They're not out there waiting. They're not gonna use their intelligence on your book.