I've been a little bit obsessed with religion, without being a religious person, for about a decade.

My wife and I left New York when she got pregnant - we just thought it would be really hard to stay in the city.

It's like the human race has been programmed for misery.

The interesting part about the writing process is that you can never see all the way to the end, not if something is happening over the course of a year and a half, or two years.

I'm not sure that it's possible to write a novel about people who don't transgress or stumble, people who don't surprise themselves with the things they do, people who can explain all their actions with perfect logical consistency. At least it's not possible for me to write that sort of novel.

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.

When things don't go well, it helps to think of yourself as a genius and the rest of the world as a bunch of idiots.