Most of the people I write about have been ambitious outlanders who have been attracted to New York from other parts of the world.

The only thing worse for smoking than drinking is quitting drinking. Because then it's the only thing you can do.

Delia's arms were inscribed with a grid of self- inflicted wounds, an intricate text of self-loathing

I think it's dangerous to think you know what you're writing. I usually don't know, and usually I just discover it in the course of writing. I envy those writers who can outline a beginning, a middle, and end. Fitzgerald supposedly did it. John Irving does. Bret Easton Ellis does. But for me, the writing itself is the process of discovery. I can't see all that far ahead.

Everything becomes symbol and irony when you've been betrayed

My former wife is a very eccentric woman, which is why I still love her.

I'd like to have the kind of house someday where a carousel horse wouldn't be out of place in the living room.