I love men, the restlessness of their corrupted souls, the way they hide their heavy, murderous hearts, their sudden delicacies and small shocking acts of tenderness.

The single biggest reason I got my stories taken in various literary magazines - and I want to stress this - is because I refused to give up. Period.

Capitalism doesn't consider morality. It considers profitability.

Every now and then, I'll run into someone who claims not to like chocolate, and while we live in a country where everyone has the right to eat what they want, I want to say for the record that I don't trust these people, that I think something is wrong with them, and that they're probably - and this must be said - total duds in bed.

If you want to fight a cult, you've got to form a cult.

Even a hundred and fifty years ago, football was popular because it provided a manly spectacle that lots of men needed, after the industrial revolution. We went from a culture that lived out doors and expanded the frontier and fought the Indians to a bunch of guys in offices. So football provided this jolt, a kind of exalted cult of masculinity. And it still does that. Perhaps even more so today.

Much as I love stories, I think I'll only be satisfied with myself as a writer if I'm able to produce a novel that feels publishable. The books that truly take me away - for weeks at a time - are all novels.