I take the outline from a real person as inspiration, but the in-line is totally made up. Which is why I usually invent imaginary names.

I find poignancy in the moments when a person realizes that she has made mistakes. I am not as interested in the mistakes themselves as I am with the consequences and how the person responds to her realization.

I do want to write about social/cultural/historical context. I'm interested in relationships, in character, but within a specific social context. Which is kind of a political thing, I admit that. But it's what I'm interested in, and it's how I believe human behavior is legible.

The writer has to take risks and go somewhere full of mystery and possibility for the novel to deepen over the years it takes to write it.

Even a documentary portrait of a person that tries to be very accurate is shaped by the filmmaker in so many ways.

Your memories from your early childhood seem to have such purchase on your emotions. They are so concrete.

I am a great procrastinator. When the writing is going really well, the laundry piles up.