The issue isn't, Am I good enough? No. The issue is, Do I not have any other choice? Will and desire don't matter. Ability doesn't matter. Need is the only thing that matters.

The novel is about, for me, sustained and organized looking. I do think that people have a hunger for a sustained engagement, that concentration that the book can offer.

I want what I write to be deeply engaging and strange and true.

You are always working towards the moments in which characters experience reckonings or insight or change. I like to track them past those moments.

The writer has to be brave, I think.

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.

A good novel should be deeply unsettling - its satisfactions should come from its authenticity and its formal coherence. We must feel something crucial is at stake.