I don't quite operate within the realist mode. I kind of push the stories out towards the cusp of believability - that's the area of interest for me.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
In order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.
The fact is, for all the critics' talk about me as a realist, I'm making everything up - everything. It is all about imagining with me.
I have realised just how important it is to readers to feel that fictional stories are based on reality.
I love making characters real and believable, through my own experience and choices.
So far, everything I've worked on has been deeply connected to reality. I'm not constitutionally opposed to working on something completely fictional, either. It just happens that a lot of these stories have crossed my path in a way that makes them intriguing, but I'm up for anything that's intellectually engaging.
What I dislike is conventional realism - a system of gestures, descriptions, psychological revelations that was once a vital way of representing the world but has become hackneyed through endless repetition. I'd argue that a conventional realist isn't a realist at all, but a falsifier of the real.
The people I write are real to me, and basically, they tell me about their environments on a need-to-know basis.
I write from what I take to be the realist's point of view, looking at life as it really is - or the way I see it to be.
I've done a number of things based on real people or true stories or based on books, and I'm a great believer that you have to be true to the script.
One of the things I strive for is realism. I need to be as real as possible in the dilemmas my characters face.