I had a passionate zest for Key West life in all of its little details. I'm not sure why or where that came from, but I was so excited to be there.

I've outlived my parents, and I've had some wonderful second chances in life. I feel remarkably uncheated.

There's a view of Montana writing that seems stage-managed by the Chamber of Commerce - it's all about writers like A. B. Guthrie and Ivan Doig. It used to bother me that nobody had a scene where somebody was delivering a pizza.

I'm a really a fanatical reviser, and there comes a point where I have to declare a truce with the text, or I'll keep fooling with it forever.

I had a kind of tough early life. I had a tough time in school. I had an unsympathetic family in terms of what I was trying to do. I decided that my family situation was simply hopeless. I kinda bailed out, and my brother and sister didn't. I failed at marriage, which I'm very upset with myself over.

I think when I first started out, I had a kind of an exuberance about language, comedy, narrative leaps that... stopped just short of non sequiturs. And I'm much more cautious now.