I love people, but I don't do so well in a system. We're poor, and we lead a very different kind of life. We depend on other people so much.

You go through your life feeling like an outsider, and you respond to society in a different way when you feel like an outsider.

I love a big book, but it's what most people like which makes commerce sing.

I love playing a villain. I think that there's something freeing about that, and it's a different kind of challenge.

When I'm not writing, I do a lot of research reading on the shape of civilization. Fiction can be a lot of different things... but I feel like it's my job to write about the way things are.

Whenever I write, I write what I find to be the way people are. I never use any symbolism at all, but if you write as true to life as you possibly can, people will see symbolism. They'll all see different symbolism, but they're apt to because you can see it in life.