The professorial dictum has always been to write what you know, but I say write what you don't know and find something out. And it works.

At best, I consider flying an unavoidable necessity, a time to resurrect forgotten prayers and contemplate the end of all joy in a twisted howling heap of machinery; at worst, I rank it right up there with psychotic episodes and torture at the hands of malevolent strangers.

If I'm doing my job correctly, I'm presenting a scenario for you as the reader to engage with on your own. I mean that's what the best art is supposed to do.

Criticism can be wonderful, especially in making connections in an interpretive way. But by applying theories randomly, it's an interesting exercise, but I don't think it illuminates the literature.

I have many enemies and they all think I'm being highfalutin calling it performance, but the word "reading" has a connotation of something academic with the lights on and you're going to get a lecture. I'm looking to blow my audiences away by giving a fine, dramatic performance and reminding them of why they love stories.

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

I always dread the process of writing because I'm not a writer. I'm an audible guy, I'm a verbal guy. I love to talk. I write a book every couple years, but it just takes everything out of me to get a book out.