Nostalgia is partly illusion in that we remember things differently as we get older, etc. But that doesn't mean, when historians look back on the 1950s, say, from the year 2090, it won't be judged as a saner, slower, less narcissistic, more family-focused, and economically secure time.

I worked in a paper mill all my adult life and there were a lot of funny guys there. So you pick up on that. Even though something really bad might have happened to somebody you can still make a joke out of it.

If a person does this for just a couple of years and discovers that it just isn't for him, that's okay. At least he can move on knowing that he gave it his best shot.

Knockemstiff is a collection of short stories set in the holler of the same name in southern Ohio where I grew up. I tried to link the stories together through the place and some recurring characters.

When I first started out, I was trying to write stories about nurses and lawyers and a lot of people I didn't know anything about, and they just weren't working.

I've always been a bit of a pessimist in regard to mankind.

Unless he had whiskey running through his veins, Willard came to the clearing every morning and evening to talk to God. Arvin didn't know which was worse, the drinking or the praying. As far back as he could remember, it seemed that his father had fought the Devil all the time.