I think that any time a person comes face-to-face with their own mortality - close enough to Death that they can smell its breath - they have a choice: 1) Fall to pieces; 2) Reassemble yourself and keep walking.

I'm still an obsessive personality, and I still think I'm right, and I still believe my literary balls hang far lower than nearly anyone else's alive.

The criticism that has most consistently bothered me is the allegation that I'm a schlockmeister whose only objective is to shock people.

I can't tell you how many times people - through the anonymity and safety of the Internet, of course - have told me 'You beat women' as if it was an ongoing, daily thing. The only person ever brave enough to say it to my face quickly surrendered his courage when I said, 'Would you like to step outside and see if I can beat men, too?'

My crazy parents and those crazy Catholic nuns didn't do a good job of forcing me to keep the Ten Commandments, but they kept me forever fixated on the very idea of a taboo.

I'm the only convict who couldn't get into Australia.

I don't think fatherhood's changed me so much as it's conjured protective instincts I've had all along.