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One constant writing ritual, no matter what I'm writing, is that I cannot write if people are around me. It wigs me out - the idea that someone is reading as I'm writing stuff.

I'm just not that comfortable writing so much about myself.

I am human, when people write bad stuff about me it bothers me, but I know that will never end.

I don't like writing with real people in mind.

I won't let people write anything they want to about me.

Writing is, by its nature, interior work. So being forced to be around people is a great gift for a novelist. You get to be reminded, daily, of how people think, how they speak, how they live; the things they worry about, the things they hope for, the things they fear.

It's possible I'm a weird person, you know, and if I could only write for people who are like me, I wouldn't have any audience at all. Ultimately, I'm my audience. I'm writing stories for myself. I don't have kids of my own, and I don't hang around kids all that much. Maybe that puts me at a disadvantage.

I'm always shy and timid when I write in front of people.

I don't write for any particular kind of person.