You can't write ... on the strength of influence. You can only write a good story or a good novel by yourself.

I didn't read a serious book until I was 19.

You can't write ... on the strength of influence. You can only write a good story or a good novel by yourself.

Someone wanted me to write a profile for ESPN about the commissioner of baseball, and I said, "He's just some suit! Some Republican. No!" I mean if you want me to write about baseball, boxing or football, I'll write about those things because I watch them, I think about them a lot and I like them. But I don't want to write about Barry Bonds.

With imagination, you can put something where nothing was.

Maybe I'm a serial regional writer. First here, then there, across the map.

I'm trying to cause people to be interested in the particulars of their lives because I think that's one thing literature can do for us. It can say to us: pay attention. Pay closer attention. Pay stricter attention to what you say to your son.