I think about some of the novels I love - The Stranger, Disgrace, Quicksand and Passing, Giovanni's Room, The Talented Mr. Ripley. I think I'm more intrigued by characters who don't do the right thing and where we are allowed to identify with their shame/dishonesty/envy... whatever.

I didn't read about it for school. It was just for myself. I was interested in cults in general but Jonestown was the most interesting of all the cults I studied.

I'm not trying to be coy, but I think everyone notices these things like skin color but some people are more aware that they are noticing them than others, maybe. If that makes sense.

I don't like stories that are too neat and too resolved. I think resolutions can be deadening for the reader.

I wrote the first draft of the New People quickly but it had been percolating a lot longer. It's a hard question to answer because I'd been working on another novel for years and when I gave up on that, this one came very easily. But I think the work had been going on a lot longer than the actual writing.

I find myself speaking through the other characters, putting ideas in their voices and heads. Writing almost becomes a splitting of myself into multiple personalities. But I don't write to make an argument on behalf of any of the characters, or to prove anything about a character. I think that's important that I be serving the story first and not my own point of view.

I guess the subject of race is so natural to me I never think of it as hefty. It's something I talk about and joke about and discuss with my loved ones every day of my life.