For many people it's Facebook, or sports on TV, whatever it is. I have my own demons that I battle. But whatever they are, you wish you could not do them. For most of us it's "I cannot get off Facebook." But imagine that your demon has you living on the street. I don't think those compulsions and obsessions are that different.

The neighborhoods I grew up in were poor and full of drug users. I don't think you have to look that hard to find those kinds of lives. But I also don't think you have to have experienced it really close to be able to empathize.

The first fiction I ever wrote was short stories. I was writing short stories in my late teens and early twenties, and I think it's how you teach yourself to write.

It's once I discover the people inside that the story really gets going, and then the formal invention becomes less important. It's just the way in; it's the door; and then what's behind it is always some kind of people, which I think probably makes me more in the tradition of realistic fiction because that's usually what I'm interested in, the people.

I think the path to becoming a writer has become more through the novel. It's easier to get a novel published than a book of stories, obviously, especially through big publishers.

The stories tend to be what I work on when I'm stuck. Something will just pop into my head and I'll think that's more of a story.

Because I'm a novelist, I think in terms of structure. The way I keep going is through structure. It's what inspires me and pushes me through.

At peace? Who but the insane would ever be at peace? What person who has enjoyed life could possibly think one is enough? Who could live even a day and not feel the sweet ache of regret?

I've been a dad since I was nineteen, so I think a lot about fatherhood and the power of that sacrifice in your life.