I think cults never stop being interesting and I'm intrigued by how we all do a tiny bit of submitting to a larger group - and how they can sneak up on you.

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

Motherhood. It was hard to get lost in anything else completely when children were 3 years old.

I'm increasingly less interested in classic storylines and that arc that we have come to expect.

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.

In terms of music, each novel is different but I usually find my way into an era through the music. In this novel the New People, I listened to a lot of 90s hip-hop, which was just so genius. Also, all the musical references in the book from the Peoples Temple one and only album to Luther Vandross.

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.