I'm a very old-fashioned novelist. I write 19th-century novels, where a lot of rules apply.

So, I don't work in terms of real time. I don't work in a timely fashion.

Newspapers are even worse for me than ice cream; headlines, and the big issues that generate the headlines, are pure fat.

It´s natural to want someone you love to do what you want, or what you think would be good for them, but you have to let everything happen to them. You can't interfere with people you love any more than you're supposed to interfere with people you don't even know. And that's hard, ..., because you often feel like interfering -you want to be the one who makes the plans.

When I feel like being a director, I write a novel.

And when you love a book, commit one glorious sentence of it-perhaps your favorite sentence-to memory. That way you won't forget the language of the story that moved you to tears.

I believe in rules of behavior, and I'm quite interested in stories about the consequences of breaking those rules.