I have a sustained interest in frippery. I can't refute the monster accusation, either. Some writers are awful on the page and kind in person. More often it's the other way around. I'd say I'm probably the same amount of asshole on the page as in life. I do try to be entertaining about it, however - in both places.

Does people not asking me about Asian American literature mean they don't see it as its own literary tradition? I certainly believe in it as its own literary tradition, because your race plays a great factor in how you are seen by the world, and how you see the world; the fact that I'm an Asian American isn't incidental to who I am as a writer. Where it becomes difficult is defining what, if anything identifiable at all, makes an Asian American book an Asian American book, other than the fact of its creator being Asian. And I'd argue that there is nothing identifiable beyond that.

It is always sort of unnerving to hear from people who've read my books. I'm not reading any of the reviews and most of my friends haven't read it - they bought it, which is all I frankly care about, but they haven't read it.

We're living in a literary age, at least in America, that is marked by a sense of distance, a coolness, in all senses of that word. To be too obviously, unapologetically emotional is to risk being considered foolish, or at the very least not serious.

Many writers hate the shilling process, and I understand that. However, it's really the only thing about the publication process you can somewhat control. You can't affect reviews. But you can try to find your book an audience. One of the problems with the book publishing industry is that their publicity efforts tend to be spent on people who already read, and know how to discover, literary fiction.

I'm an indulgent writer - I'm not sure, however, that's something I'm interested in changing. Writing should be indulgent: you should take big risks on the page, you should make big mistakes, you should be excessive at times. I let myself do as a writer what I probably would be less likely to allow as an editor.

When you don't have to depend upon your creative work for money, you'll never really have to compromise... Knowing that is hugely liberating as well as artistically clarifying... Being practical about where your money comes from means you can be romantic about your writing... I believe that a healthy society is one that supports its artists, but I also know that that privilege, of being only an artist, is afforded to just a small number. Most of us have to find something else - or live a highly disciplined life, which I'm not willing to do.