A period of time is as much an organising principle for a work of fiction as a sense of place. You can do geography, as Faulkner did, or you can dwell on a particular period. It provides the same framework. ↗
It took me about three years to write About Grace. I wasn't teaching two of those years, so I was working eight-hour days, five days a week. And it would include research and reading - it wasn't just a blank page, laying down words. ↗
There's this large trend - I think the next trend in the Web, sort of Web 2.0 - which is to have users really express, offer, and market their own content, their own persona, their identity. ↗
All my fans tell me what a glamorous life I have, but I tell them how hard I work and how many nights I spend alone with my dogs, eating chicken pot pie in my bedroom. ↗
In the black culture, certain kids are given nicknames that they roll with forever; the nicknames outweigh their real names. I'm one of those scenarios. ↗
I used to get stressed out all the time when I thought winning was important. I wanted to try to win and help my kids win. Once I figured out it wasn't about winning or losing, it was about teaching these kids about being men, that's when I started to relax. ↗
