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'All Quiet on the Western Front' is just sort of there isn't it? Every single trope of the First World War, and anti-war writing in general, is in there.

I had no plan to write a western novel, and when I realized it was happening, I was pretty surprised by it. But you have to go with what feels right.

I can't envision an honest war novel that left war in a positive light.

The Western poet and writer of romance has exactly the same kind of difficulty in comprehending Eastern subjects as you have in comprehending Western subjects.

Everyone keeps saying the western's dead, but it's not.

I can't imagine writing a novel without some sound. When you're facing a few hundred blank pages, silence can be cold.

Your landscape in a western is one of the most important characters the film has. The best westerns are about man against his own landscape.

I want to read about a character doing something fairly quiet where I can picture who the character is, and what their attitude towards the world is - which I'm a lot more interested in than what they do under the pressure of a gunfight.