I suppose this is, essentially, my perspective on life. Just because we've made mistakes and learned things from them intellectually doesn't mean we won't continue to make the same mistakes over and over again.

There's definitely a magical quality to writing that can't be explained. I can write something I love in two days, or I can work on a story every day for months and it never comes together.

It's difficult for me to imagine any scene differently because I've read the book so many times. The book, as a whole, seems like a document that wouldn't withstand any changes at this point. Or perhaps I simply can't imagine having to revise it again.

Perhaps adding a line or two of dialogue to try to better capture an emotion. But I've found that if the story isn't there in the beginning, right from the start, I generally can't beat it into shape no matter how much rewriting I do.

I think training your instinct comes from writing and reading. There's no big secret. And reading slush helps, as well; I'd recommend everyone edit a literary magazine at some point. It's time-consuming, but there's a lot to learn from other writers who are also learning. The patterns (twelve stories about whales in this batch?) are also interesting.

Making all of those words work together is difficult. It took a lot of cleaning up, a lot of rewriting scenes in order to make them more vivid. I used everything - every oddity I've ever seen on the side of the road, every interesting memory I could make relevant.

It's something that's difficult to explain but I think all writers work this way to some extent, whether we're aware of it or not. For me, writing has little to do with thinking. I don't want to control the narrative. I listen to the rhythm of the words and dialogue and try to give the characters the space in which to say and do what they want without intervening too much.