No two books come out the same way. Some I write by the seat of my pants; others are planned in minute detail.

I have not watched the TV show. I do not generally watch TV sci-fi drama shows. They make me itch.

Fiction is about human beings, first and foremost. (It's not impossible to write fiction with no human protagonists, but it's very hard to keep the reader interested ...)

I have no policy, for or against: only a personal style. Which is to say, I use them when I think it's appropriate to; for example, an internal monologue by a locquacious and verbose narrator is more likely to be larded with adverbs than an exchange of instant messages between cops at a crime scene.

I don't do flash fiction.

One ape's hallucination is another ape's religious experience - it just depends on which one’s god module is overactive at the time.

Biggest influence: my mother.