I'm beginning to believe that anything I do to extend my life is just going to be outweighed by the agony of living it.

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.

The humor I came up with is, for the most part, a bit crude or guttural, and many people aren't going to get it or enjoy it, but some do, and that means a lot to me - to know that I made someone laugh.

I'm always doubting my work, even when people are kind enough to say good things. I still have a hard time believing I've written some books, let alone that they've actually done pretty well.

I don't think my book is any more shocking than if I went out right now and brought back your local newspaper and found a story that happened around here yesterday or the day before that's just as shocking as anything in my book.

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.

I sort of like writing about weird characters, I guess.