The regional tags are often pejorative and dismissive. Don't think of place-bound stories, in other words, but of stories with a strong sense of place.

Novels are written, not wished into existence. You have to sit your ass in the chair or nothing gets done.

I revise like crazy. I start revising before the pen hits the paper.

We read novels because we need stories; we crave them; we can’t live without telling them and hearing them. Stories are how we make sense of our lives and of the world. When we’re distressed and go to therapy, our therapist’s job is to help us tell our story. Life doesn’t come with plots; it’s messy and chaotic; life is one damn, inexplicable thing after another. And we can’t have that. We insist on meaning. And so we tell stories so that our lives make sense.

Reading is also a creative activity if you're doing it right. You can learn more from a story that's left the tracks than from a successful story.

There were the fairy tales my father told to me at bedtime. All the standards. I thought my father invented wolves.

Writing a story, you understand, is not done by consensus. But we do learn from each other, and we remind ourselves how important this work we're doing is.