Wanting to know all kinds of things is perfect for novelists, because novelists are generalists. We're not specialists in anything, except, hopefully, writing.

There are lots of unlikable characters in literature. It doesn't mean they're not fascinating.

Obviously the Internet makes everything easier - you get people's addresses and so on and everything seems much more accessible.

It's true you have to screen out a lot living in the city. I stayed away from New York for a long time after college, and when I was first back, I'd read The Village Voice and feel like I was having a panic attack.

I'm very interested in animal behavior, and the relationship of human beings to other animal behavior.

Now that I'm an older woman, I'm so much more aware of the changes - almost too aware. I feel sorry for being so dismissive. You have to think about what you're thinking about and realize that you're thinking it.

You have to create the space for the possibility of people speaking as they do. If writing is supposed to lead us in any way or educate or suggest other ways of being, it can't do so by simply reflecting what's considered to be realistic.