I think we fall in love and become adults and become citizens in a way by writing stories about ourselves.

I'm bred for farm work, and for such folk, the only A's you get come from effort. Strife and strain are all the world can offer, and they temper you into something unbreakable because Lord knows they'll try -- without let up -- to break you.

If you lie to your husband - even about something so banal as how much you drink - each lie is a brick in a wall going up between you, and when he tells you he loves you, it's deflected away.

Im always terrified when Im writing.

A pool game mixes ritual with geometry.

I do have a really good memory. I mean, like, I can remember all the phone numbers of everybody on the street I grew up on.

I was 40 years old before I became an overnight success, and I'd been publishing for 20 years.