In high school I was the dog, always, and I never have felt comfortable or right in my body, and part of my whole exhibitionist thing has probably been a way of testing to see whether or not I really was this repulsive creature that I felt like for so long.

I don't think it is possible to give tips for finding one's voice; it's one of those things for which there aren't really any tricks or shortcuts, or even any advice that necessarily translates from writer to writer. All I can tell you is to write as much as possible.

In France, for instance, one magazine writer was convinced that On The Road had been a huge influence on Lost Souls and was crushed to learn that I hadn't read the one until after I'd written the other.

You can only maintain an immensely gothic attitude for so long before either killing yourself or beginning to feel like a poser.

My mother is an office manager, my father a professor of economics and financial planner.

In the Netherlands I read the first chapter of Exquisite Corpse to an audience that laughed in all the places I thought were funny - an experience I've never had in America!

Some of the food in Liquor is food I've really eaten filtered through a veil of fiction.