 As a writer, you can't allow yourself the luxury of being discouraged and giving up when you are rejected, either by agents or publishers. You absolutely must plow forward. |
| I think people tend to see the bigger point, which is maybe not fitting in and feeling like you didn't have the childhood that you expected you would have, or that you felt lonely or struggled with drugs and alcohol or just that you were able to achieve your dreams. |
| I love to both give and receive very old books. |
| I really look at my childhood as being one giant rusty tuna can that I continue to recycle in many different shapes. |
| I was on the cover of a lot of newspapers. I was on the cover of USA Today for every single day for a month. I was on the masthead, so I tend to get recognized a lot, and in weird places. It's always flattering, and it's always odd. It's always at the worst possible time. |
| And I tend to listen to NPR when I'm not writing. |
| There's never a false note in a Berg novel. |
| I've just finished my next collection, Possible Side Effects, and I'm now working on a collection of holiday stories as well as a memoir about my relationship with my father. |
| I'm like the guy who prepares your taxes or a dentist. I'm very conservative and boring in a lot of ways. |
| When people meet me, many times they're very surprised because they expect someone who is kind of wacky with seven piercings and very hip and cool and New York City, and I'm not. |
| But my favorite band is Curbside Life, out of Chicago. |
| My parents had this relationship that was really terrifying. I mean, the level of hatred that they had, and the level of physical abuse - my mother would beat up my father, basically - and I think I was drawn to images on television that were bright and reflective. |
| I was in advertising for years. That was cushy, you know? It's pretty cushy in a lot of ways, but I hated it. |
| Because I've lived in one room my entire life, working at the same table that you use to pay bills at and eat at. It's going to be nice to have actual space. |
| Marriage is overdone. As long as there are people, people are going to find it interesting. Topics: Marriage |
| I knew that if I wrote a new book every six months or every year, if I continued to read great books, eventually I would write something worthy of publication. I understood I might be in my forties or my fifties or even my sixties, but I felt confident that it would happen. |
| As a child, I was never drawn toward depraved or extreme situations; I really wanted a normal little childhood. Unfortunately, that's just not what happened. |
| Once I decided to write, to be published, I knew it would happen. |
| The secret to being a writer is that you have to write. It's not enough to think about writing or to study literature or plan a future life as an author. You really have to lock yourself away, alone, and get to work. |
| But I can also write in crappy motel rooms, while standing in line, or sitting in the dentist's chair. |
