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" You can't take a story and just stretch it out - that does not a novel make. "

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" The short story is kind of a precision tool. It allows me a certain type of freedom to go in and out of the American landscape, without having to commit myself to a full-length novel. I find a lot of novels out there very boring. "

" I think all good short stories are about what it means to tell a good story. "

" I'm a relatively optimistic kind of guy. "

" There is this idea of 'north,' and if you're from Michigan and you wandered the Upper Peninsula, you know what it feels like. The sky has a particular vibe, a coldness, stretching into the upper reaches of Canada. "

" Vietnam and Iraq are part of the same national trauma and delusion; we folded the war up when Reagan became president and unpacked it with Bush. "

" From George Martin's classically inspired production of the Beatles to Peter Gabriel's early solo masterpieces, to Stereolab's beautiful loops and blips, U.K.-based bands have often found a way to squeeze warmth and compassion from the stone-cold - especially now that the tubes are gone - machinery of the recording studio. "

" In the days following 9/11, when we were reeling and disoriented, there was a kind of solace to be found in old recordings, and even pseudo-folk singers like James Taylor seemed to be safeguarding something, drawing back bygone days. "

" We believe in cures; we're a quick-fix country, and we drive forward, and we eat up what we have extremely fast in terms of natural resources and also ideas and intellectual property. We're kind of wilfully stupid a lot of the time, anti-intellectual. "

" I was an at-home father, taking care of them for seven years when they were babies. I was one of those new-age, at-home dads. "

" I think a good story can do as much as a novel; not the exact same thing, of course, but just as much artistically. They're different beasts, but to tackle an expansive country like the United States, you're either going to write a big novel, or go in to various points on the map and write stories or poems. "

" My characters - no, make that most characters - are seeking the shelter of narrative resolution, a place of quiet and grace. "

" I was a kid who was born and raised on Johnny Cash. My father played 'At Folsom Prison' constantly. Cash was the only thing I remember coming from our big, warm stereo console. Even then, I knew Cash was uncool. I knew he was an unhip Republican. "

" History is delusional. Not just an illusion, it's a delusion. America is this giant country, so it has these big delusions, and history is where delusions play out. "

" We're all building our narratives in our heads. "

" A short story collection can be as exciting as a novel. It is a real complete experience, like when you listen to a real good recording, a Beatles record, and there are so many good songs. "

" I'm not at all interested in simply reporting what's here right now, or cranking out an entertainment device that's going to touch the widest number of people. I'm interested in digging and excavating as deep as I can go into those small eternal moments and how they expand out, or close in, on the lives of my characters. "

" Typically, I spend a lot of time - mostly in the morning - kind of drifting, reading, walking down along the river, looking at photographs, or even driving around. Then, if I'm lucky, I get to work in the early afternoon, one way or another. "

" Those who see beauty almost too intensely can easily look mad to those who are functioning within the confines of so-called normal life. "

" I think that those moments before a performer plays are the moments when the potential for something to be created may - or may not - arrive. "

" As a story writer, you have work with sharp but relatively small tools, the picks of metaphor, the shovel blade of images, the trowel of point of view, and then you delicately lift and brush in the revision with love and care knowing that one slip, and you might damage an extremely delicate thing. "

" It's better to know your story than not to know. "

" Americans are pragmatic; we want quick, clean, simple solutions to vast problems. The paradox is that we're a deeply confessional culture, but we're not often contemplative. "

" There's a huge distance between who I am as a regular person and what takes place in my fiction. "

" I like landscape, I guess. It's kind of a game to see how you can describe it. "

" A kiss is often about the future and the past. A lost dream, about the discretion of the idealism. "

" I knew for years I wanted to write a novel that addressed the personal trauma of my older sister, who suffered - and still suffers - from mental illness. For a long time I imagined - and I know it's absurd - that she was an indirect casualty of the Vietnam War. "

" The more you know about Bob Dylan, the less you know. A truly enigmatic artist, Mr. Dylan's work and life offer vaporous handholds, explanations, and instructions. Attempt to grasp them, and they will only dissipate and re-form into another contexture or idea. "

" I've got deep roots in Kalamazoo, with a grandfather, Harold Allen, who was a big part of Upjohn Co. for many years as the corporate secretary and friends with W. E. Upjohn. "

" Wars never simply end, not for those in combat and not for the culture, and one way or another, they shape-shift from generation to generation. "

" Folk songs, whatever else they might be, are mainly craft. "