I always joke that every novel is really about the same thing: one person's struggle against society.

We have today and hopefully tomorrow to be the best version of ourselves.

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

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.

I just thought it was important that people knew right from the jump that I've got problems. But in all seriousness, that's a huge part of my writing process.

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.

I'm a very tactile learner, so I need analog index cards, moving them all about, trying out various sequences for the book's architecture.