Writing a novel is actually searching for victims. As I write I keep looking for casualties. The stories uncover the casualties."(Interview in Writers at Work: The Paris Review Interviews, Eighth Series, ed. George Plimpton, 1988)

I realize that a writer's business is setting fire to Piggy Sneed-and trying to save him-again and again; forever.

It’s like reading a bad newspaper or a bad piece in a magazine." (on Tom Wolfe)

She was a passionate reader, and she thought that reading was one of the noblest efforts of all; in contrast, she found writing to be a great waste of time—a childish self-indulgence, even messier than finger painting—but she admired reading, which she believed was an unselfish activity that provided information and inspiration. She must have thought it a pity that some poor fools had to waste their lives writing in order for us to have sufficient reading material. (page 236)

Plot is a map and I begin with it. It is what made me admire the novels of the 19th century; that the stories are foreshadowed. TheyÕre going someplace.

I'm a very old-fashioned novelist. I write 19th-century novels, where a lot of rules apply.

When I feel like being a director, I write a novel.

Be serious. Life hurts. Reflect what hurts. I don't mean that you can't also be funny, or have fun, but at the end of the day, stories are about what you lose.

There's no reason you should write any novel quickly.