For 'So Cold the River,' I'm actually working on adapting the book with Scott Silver, who was just nominated for an Oscar for 'The Fighter,' and who also wrote '8 Mile,' which I think is a terrific screenplay. The chance to work with Scott is a tremendous pleasure and I'm learning a lot.

I think pressure can be an incentive toward improvement, and while I'm not denying that I feel some, I will also stress that it is self-inflicted and hopefully can be channeled in a healthy way.

I started writing as soon as I started reading.

I think anyone who writes suspense fiction and says that King isn't an influence is either lying or being foolish.

Stephen King, by far, is the standard-bearer. I think anyone who writes suspense fiction and says that King isn't an influence is either lying or being foolish. I read his book 'On Writing' before I read pretty much any of his fiction.

I'd worked at a small town newspaper, and I was thinking of all the strange stories that I had seen float through the newsroom in my time there that were dismissed as kind of amusing curiosities. Somehow from that I got to this idea of an eccentric alcoholic who built a lighthouse in the woods.

We understand tornadoes scientifically, but it still feels supernatural. The randomness makes it feel supernatural.