You can't really write until the characters kind of show up one day and tell you what they're going to say. You start to hear the rhythm of the way the people talk, and then it becomes easier.

Everyone is doing their job within a system. Even the revolutionaries are in a system.

You can't really write until the characters kind of show up one day and tell you what they're going to say. You start to hear the rhythm of the way the people talk, and then it becomes easier.

In Tehran, the 444 days of the Iran Hostage Crisis was the first world event in which you could literally have live events beamed into your living room. Now, every world event plays out on its own, and as a media event.

And I think it's true of any big organization... Bureaucracies and organizations make it hard to do the right thing sometimes.

Famously, the CIA is somewhere where marriages hardly ever last because it's obviously such a strange lifestyle.

You have to stick to what you love, as writing is such a lonely and depressing existence... stick to what you love and someone will hear your voice.