I still think about the writers I loved when I was a kid.

My main reader was my wife Sheila, and I haven't written a lot since she died.

The thing that grounds you, and the thing that really gives you a sense of wholeness, is your family, friends and your community. Those are the things that can mirror back to you what you're experiencing, and can affirm to you that the stories you are telling are true.

I guess I've been blessed with insomnia because I do a lot of my writing at night. Because I don't sleep as much as I probably should, I have that extra time to write weird stories and think odd thoughts.

I've never been able to sleep very much, even when I was a kid. I used to hate being forced to lay in bed in the darkness, and just shifting in bed and staring at the shadows.

I'm certainly very influenced by what you would call 'contemporary headline horror,' stuff that is true crime or for one reason or another catches our attention in the media, those strange cases that we end up obsessing about. I'm always influenced by weird anecdotes and news.

Plot and scene are still the hardest things for me, though I think they're the building blocks of what makes a story work.