I'm a semi-failed writer, but I'm a capital-F Failed musician.

I'll never be the sort of author who sells that many copies. You'll never see a book of mine being sold on a table at Costco, between the extra-large jorts and a barrel of salsa. And I wouldn't have it any other way. I'll be indie till I die.

My musical sensibilities were formed around punk rock, that quintessential dilution of an art that's both ugly and lovely at the same time.

I always feel that as the author, once I know what a character is ashamed of, then I can go about making her truthful on the page.

Yes, things happened to me - brutal things - but I'm not going to give them so much clout by dwelling on them, empowering them to haunt my heart years after the events transpired. And no good comes from that. These ghosts don't need us to help them stay alive. If we're after real deal healing, these ghosts must desiccate.

In my life the right question is simply this: What can I do to be happy today?

Shamefulness is always a huge part of my characterizations. I like protagonists that reveal, either through "honesty" in their various thought processes or via their actions, perhaps telling us things they're not so keen on disclosing through their interactions with the outside world. Probably both during the duration of a novel.