If I can tell you the story from beginning to end in five minutes, I'm ready to start writing.

I write because I can't imagine not writing.

In a given scene I may know nothing more than how it's supposed to end, most of the time not even that. Scenes are improvised. A character does or says something, and with as much spontaneity and schizophrenia as I can muster, another character responds. In this way, everything I write is spontaneous chain reaction and I'm running around playing leapfrog in my brain trying to "be" all my people.

Beat him, eat him and get out.

I write because I write - as anyone in the arts does. You're a painter because you feel you have no choice but to paint. You're a writer because this is what you do.

The more I hung out with detective squads, the more there was always one guy or two guys or a woman who had a case that they were the primary on years ago, it was never solved, and they take that case into their retirements.

I started thinking about my relationship with my students; I'm this guy who comes in from book - and movie - land and descends on angel wings into their classroom.