I feel like today we always glorify the young, just-plucked-from-college writer. But it's much harder to start writing later, in middle age, struggling on a book around a full-time job and family.

The isolation, the separateness, is always a part of any utopia.

No gasp at a miracle that is truly miraculous because the magic lies in the fact that you knew it was there for you all along.

I always start out with an idea, even a boring idea, that becomes a question I don't have answers to.

It was my father who could do no wrong. So I didn't think of it as, oh, look, my father's a violent man.

Love is divine only and difficult always. If you think it is easy you are a fool. If you think it is natural you are blind. It is a learned application without reason or motive except that it is God.

The children - I call them children when they're under 18 - are hungry for that love. The drugs are just a sleep that you can't even wake up from, because you might remember what you did when you were there. There's no place for them - there should be a rehabilitation center on every corner, along with McDonald's and the banks. This is serious business. The waiting lists are incredible. I mean, it's terrible. It's really terrible.