A mystery novel localizes the awesome force of the real death outside the book, winds it tightly in a plot.

The world is full of abandoned meanings. In the commonplace I find unexpected themes and intensities.

It's my contention that each book creates its own structure and its own length. I've written three or four slim books. It may be that the next novel is a big one, but I don't know.

The greater the scientific advance, the more primitive the fear.

Nostalgia is a product of dissatisfaction and rage. It´s a settling of grievances between the present and the past.

In my experience, writing a novel tends to create its own structure, its own demands, its own language, its own ending. So for much of the period in which I'm writing, I'm waiting to understand what's going to happen next, and how and where it's going to happen. In some cases, fairly early in the process, I do know how a book will end. But most of the time, not at all, and in this particular case, many questions are still unanswered, even though I've been working for months.

There are dead stars that still shine because their light is trapped in time. Where do I stand in this light, which does not strictly exist? (155)