I realized that I was writing about folks with lots of skills, especially fix-it skills and survival skills, who were nonetheless not doing well in the new-millennium America.

In a regular class I don't focus on the form, but I think that focus is helpful for brainstorming and coming up with ideas quickly, especially with autobiographical material.

A mathematical proof is beautiful, but when you're finished, it's really only about one thing. A story can be about many things.

I think back when I was kind of a crappy writer, I really did know my time was better spent working and having adventures and seeing the world.

Cocoa-buttered girls were stretched out on the public beach in apparently random alignments, but maybe if a weather satellite zoomed in on one of those bodies and then zoomed back out, the photos would show the curving beach itself was another woman, a fractal image made up of the particulate sunbathers. All the beaches pressed together might form female landmasses, female continents, female planets and galaxies. No wonder men felt tense.

Drugs and drinking affect every family I know, country and city, middle-class and poor.

I like living near my family, and near the people I understand the best. The landscape of Michigan speaks to me, and the humility and humor of the people here makes sense. It just feels right to live here, in a place where I don't dare put on airs.