I'm never happy with what I've written. You imagine, before you start, there's a cathedral, and the moment it starts on the page, it's a garden shed. And then you just try to make it the best shed you can.
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Our minds and memories are crowded with the common experience of nature.
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I don't get distracted until the weight of other things left undone finally tips the balance; my mind is flooded with calls, bills, supermarkets, letters, and I have to stop and sort things out.
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If I think about the writers I love or might be influenced by, I can't write at all, so I pretend there aren't any.
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I have a study now - I used not to. I also love working in cafes; ignoring noise is good for concentration.
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When I was a child, I wanted to raise horses in Wyoming or be a cabin boy on a pirate ship.
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Remove all the traffic lights, yellow lines, one-way systems and road markings, and let blissful anarchy prevail. I imagine it would produce a kind of harmony.
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I like to come into my workspace and feel it's a living environment and not frozen, which is why I often change or add to the pictures on the wall.
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I think if you write about human relationships, you're always exploring the psyche and the soul. I don't separate certain - perhaps more extreme - things that people do from others.
