Never use 'submit' as a verb for sending work to magazine or book publishers; say 'offer,' and never, ever submit. Keep your knees unbent. Be brave.

What to know about pain is how little we do to deserve it, how simple it is to give, how hard to lose.

Nonfiction, for the most part, is facts, and it's "how I was mistreated. I was mistreated. Were you mistreated? Weren't we all mistreated?"

There is a lack of context in contemporary education. And contemporary consideration - because we live in those interiorities so much. Especially young kids who live by surfing the Web.

I can't imagine having the courage to ask a publisher to do a whole book of my poems.

I'm not a philosopher. I am the next thing to a jock, which is a novelist.

I'm an amateur, so I read what's interesting to me.