The simile has to match the tone of its surroundings and has to be like a little joke. Writing a simile that isn't funny on some level is quite hard.

Mystery, investigation, false leads, solution - we associate that structure with genre fiction, but it exists in our real lives, too. There's no reason why literary fiction shouldn't be able to acknowledge that and make it fresh.

I would love to learn how to air kiss non-awkwardly.

It seems to me that the basic plot of all historical novels is a romance swept aside by history.

There's never a bad time to put earplugs in. They're the kind of thing you can reject as a bit lame, but somebody told me to do start wearing earplugs and it turned out to be great advice.

I've never really understood that whole thing of writers avoiding other writers' novels while they're working on their own.

I don't have a day job, so I read any time of day.