From a distance, it makes perfect sense that the people and the things you think will save you are the very ones that have the power to disappoint you most bitterly, but up close it can hit you as a bewildering surprise.

I write about kids growing up, I write a lot about schools and parents, and all of my experiences with those things have been suburban experiences.

Apparently even the most awful tragedies, and the people they'd ruined, got a little stale after a while.

I was also known as Frodo because I was an early adopter of 'The Lord of the Rings.

Maybe that's what we look for in the people we love, the spark of unhappiness we think we know how to extinguish.

I no longer believe that just about everything is funny, if viewed from the proper angle.

I have actual dreams of Bruce Springsteen calling me up on stage to wear a bandanna and play rhythm guitar next to Little Steven.