Being a writer now is about so much more than writing. There's publishing, touring, marketing, web presence.

My life has been like all the lives, long and hard and full of sadness and confusion and horror, a frightening, difficult dream punctuated by brief moments of joy. And as is the case with all people's lives, the moments of joy are never often enough and never long enough.

Everything I know and I am and I have seen felt done past present past now then before now seen felt done hurt felt focus into a something beyond words beyond beyond beyond and it speaks now and it says. Stay. Fight. Live. Take it.

Some people think memoirs should be held to a perfect journalistic standard. Some people don't. Obviously I don't. My goal was never to create or to write a perfect journalistic standard of my life. It was always to be as literature.

It's cold and it's winter and the world has gone to sleep

More than anything, all I have ever wanted is to be close to someone. More than anything, all I have ever wanted is to feel as if i wasn't alone.

Being an unpublished novelist has about as much social acceptability as being a shopping bag lady.