Obviously, I like to write stories that are page-turners. But I always try my very, very hardest to be as factually true as possible.

My paranoia never ends, but I haven't been paranoid about being spied on my shadowy forces for some time now.

At the end of our conversation she (Martha Stout) turned to address you, the reader. She said if you're beginning to feel worried that you may be a psychopath, if you recognize some of those traits in yourself, if you're feeling a creeping anxiety about it, that means you are not one.

In the midst of a burning-hot shaming, calling for patience and context and understanding and empathy can really land you in trouble.

Sometimes the personalities at the helm of the madness industry are, with their drives and obsessions, as mad in their own way as those they study. And that relatively ordinary people are, more and more, defined by their maddest edges.

The snowflake never needs to feel responsible for the avalanche.

Well, I had nightmares when I was doing the Klan story all the time. I had a recurring nightmare of basically being exposed as a Jew inside the Klan compound.