I obviously read and adore traditional fiction. I teach traditional fiction; I also teach all kinds of not-so-traditional fiction.

My husband is always accusing me of being a context-free individual. He asks something and he has no idea where it came from or what it related to. I have to supply him with way more supplementary information than I ever have to supply my female friends.

We want to believe we couldn't be replaced, and that the people we love are irreplaceable.

I think what can be most shameful or embarrassing is when our bodies broadcast a secret we'd prefer no one to know. This is why I hate rashes, in particular face rashes.

The belief that one's suffering has a greater cosmic purpose, and is thus more exciting and more noble, well, it made a lot of sense to me.

I like playing with a popular cliché and making it my own by half-embracing it, half-disemboweling it.

A logic proof is: you get a starting point and an ending point, and you have to get there through all these different steps and tautologies. I approach novel writing that way. When I get to the end I have to go back and connect everything.