This is how sudden things happened that haunted forever.

When I left Iowa, I definitely never wanted to stand in front of a group of academics again and see if they approved of me. I made up my mind to take my work to the actual reading public.

I said shut up once already, with my mouth.

I had been born shoved to the margins of the world, sure, but I had volunteered for the pits.

I have a book in the pipeline of short stories. You want to hear an agent scream, say 'I'm thinking about doing a collection of short stories set in the Ozarks.

Never. Never ask for what ought to be offered.

But I've been at writing long enough now to know that every three or four books I have to start a new direction.