The harder you try to become the opposite of your parents, the more quickly you become them.

I thought about how odd it is for billions of people to be alive, yet not one of them is really quite sure of what makes people people. The only activities I could think of that humans do that have no animal equivalent were smoking, body-building and writing. That's not much, considering how special we seem to think we are.

I wouldn't mind if the consumer culture went poof! overnight because then we'd all be in the same boat and life wouldn't be so bad, mucking about with the chickens and feudalism and the like. But you know what would be absolutely horrible. The worst? ... If, as we were all down on earth wearing rags and husbanding pigs inside abandoned Baskin-Robbins franchises, I were to look up in the sky and see a jet -- with just one person inside even -- I'd go berserk. I'd go crazy. Either everyone slides back into the Dark Ages or no one does.

My writing process is ritualized and monotonous, but there's no other way to get the job done. All other fiction writers I've met say the same thing.

Tofu hot dogs are actually scarier than real hot dogs. It's like wanting the worst possible meat product without even the thrill of it actually being meat.

In periods of rapid personal change, we pass through life as though we are spellcast. We speak in sentences that end before finishing. We sleep heavily because we need to ask so many questions as we dream alone. We bump into others and feel bashful at recognizing souls so similar to ourselves.

Earth was not built for six billion people all running around and being passionate about things. The world was built for about two million people foraging for roots and grubs.