That the world was silent and cold and bare and that in this lay its terrible beauty

Fiction is socially meaningful.

Don Quixote is one that comes to mind in comparison to mine, in that they both involve journeys undertaken by older men. That is unusual, because generally the hero of a journey story is very young.

I think you have an obligation to share what you know as a writer.

I have traveled the entire state and spent a lot of time out of doors. So I have known the landscape of the Columbia Basin for quite a while, and I have had this strong feeling about it for many years.

There are things in this universe that we cannot control, and then there are the things we can. . . . Let fate, coincidence, and accident conspire; human beings must act on reason.

Writers shouldn’t underestimate the difficulty of what they’re doing, and they should treat it with great seriousness. You’re doing something that really matters, you’re telling stories that have an impact on other people and on the culture. You should tell the best stories you can possibly tell and put everything you’ve got into it.