In the summer of 2010, I had decided to get into film and TV writing, so I wrote scripts for six different ideas I had developed, and the pilot for True Detective was one of them.

Whatever story you're telling in Louisiana, the landscape is going to become a character in it.

Whatever I watched, whatever I loved in 36 years of life on Earth, probably had some influence on me.

I was raised in a heavily Catholic family. Early and consistent encounters with mysticism.

At DePauw, I was teaching writing and fiction. The things I wanted to teach, more than anything else, were form and theory of the novel, of narrative. I liked those classes.

As someone with a novelistic background, I just didn't have much interest in creating stories by committee. I don't think you necessarily get the best story through that approach.

It’s better to not have a reputation than a bad one.