Because I'm a novelist, I think in terms of structure. The way I keep going is through structure. It's what inspires me and pushes me through.

Some memories remain close; you can shut your eyes and find yourself back in them. But there are second-person memories, too, distant you memories, and these are trickier: you watch yourself in disbelief.

What business does memory have with time?

I realized the structure in a collection is how they're put together. Structuring the collection became the art of it for me. Because the stories had all been written.

The first seven years that I wrote fiction, I sent out stories and a novel and made a total of $25.

There was a time when self-promotion was considered so verboten, especially for authors.

I think the path to becoming a writer has become more through the novel. It's easier to get a novel published than a book of stories, obviously, especially through big publishers.