A richly detailed, poignant, and utterly fascinating look into another culture and how it is cross-pollinated by our own. It brings to mind the work of Ha Jin in its power and revelation of the new.

Work ethic and this determination is all part of escaping the depressive side. Of course I'm manic depressive, maybe not to the degree that Exley was, but I think all writers are. There are highs and lows. Look at David Foster Wallace.

I'm always trying to do something different and trying to keep myself amused.

There's a kind of mystery to our being and from my point of view, regarding my own parents and their parents, I'd as soon let it lie than find out who my mother's father was.

Pleasure, I remind myself, is inseparable from its lawfully wedded mate, pain.

I love satire. Evelyn Waugh is one of my favorite writers of all time. He's hilarious. He's so wicked. He's so great. On the other hand, pure satire is an imitation. It doesn't really have any heart. It only holds things up to ridicule.

I like to joke that you usually write more books before death than after death, so that's why I'm doing it. But really, I remain engaged with ideas. There are so many things happening that turn me on and I just want to examine them.