The people who review my books, generally, are kind of youngish culture writers who aspire to write books. When someone writes a book review, they obviously already self-identify as a writer. I mean, they are. They're writers, they're critics, and they're writing about a book about a writer who's a critic. So I think it's really hard for people to distance themselves from what they're criticizing.

The most wretched people in the world are those who tell you they like every kind of music 'except country.' People who say that are boorish and pretentious at the same time.

When I think about the future, I'm not necessarily arguing it's going to be better or worse. I'm just saying it's going to be different.

The essays are different because ultimately it's things I'm interested in, and I'm really just writing about myself and using those subjects as a prism.

In some ways, Halloween is much easier for women. They can just dress as sluts, and it's kind of a costume, if they never do any other time.

Americans have become conditioned to believe the world is a gray place without absolutes; this is because we're simultaneously both cowardly and arrogant. We don't know the answers, so we assume they must not exist.

I was a teenager in the '80s - and maybe I'm wrong about this - but it seemed like a bad era for movies that were scary. It was really the height of movies that were disgusting.