What we do as a community, as a society, for each other, matters as much as what we do for ourselves. It sounds a little trite, but there's a powerful amount of truth in that, I think.

What interests me about fiction is plot. And what interests me about plot is whether someone tells a story that moves me within the constraints of storytelling. And I have narrowly defined storytelling.

Sometimes [genius] is just the thing that emerges after twenty years of working at your kitchen table.

Nobody accomplishes success by themselves.

..... it would be interesting to find out what goes on in that moment when someone looks at you and draws all sorts of conclusions.

You don't start at the top if you want to find the story. You start in the middle, because it's the people in the middle who do the actual work in the world.

People don't rise from nothing.