Anthropological fieldwork is so much like writing a novel. You don't know what the hell is going on.

I had one family that used a lot of yelling and screaming, and that was very normal. Another side of my family, nobody would raise their voice at all.

I'm always interested in a claustrophobic situation where people might be powerless to do things. My first three novels were all about families. Things that happen in a house within a family, because you're a child or because you want to keep the family together, you suffer things you might not have had to suffer if you weren't in that situation.

You write the facts as you see them, and there isn't a lull with a lot of description. No wonder people like to write about murder mysteries and dead bodies!

I love this idea of trying to create that intellectual eroticism. That was what I was working toward all along.

I've always thought of writing as sort of active communication.

I'm very interested in the way people interact emotionally.