I don't know what it is about human beings but most of us really like reading about or observing sexual tension and romance. It's just so much fun. I don't know if there is some Darwinian thing in us that really responds to that, but I think the most memorable scenes to me in books and movies are the ones where a couple is about to kiss.

It is not a camera, or a reporter that makes something real and genuine; more often a camera or a reporter does the opposite.

I think there is still pressure to marry. I think there is still pressure to have children. If you're middle or upper class, those pressures exist at a later age now.

There are so many people who are so much better qualified to write about politics than I am.

I don't think it's shameful to admit that some days your time can be better spent reading than writing.

I like it when characters are some combination of appealing and maybe flawed or self-interested. I think in terms of scenes, and what I want a scene to achieve, and I think that the psychological realism arises from that.

Perhaps fiction has, for me, served a similar purpose--what is a narrative arc if not the imposition of order on disparate events?--and perhaps it is my avid reading that has been my faith all along.