Alice McDermott

My children have gone to Catholic school... Part of their whole education is talking about the inner life and looking at your life, even though you're only 15 or 16 - thinking about your mortality, thinking about the value of your life, thinking about your obligations. ”

Family dynamics are true over time, across generations and different cultures. ”

I am trying to cultivate the notion that constantly misplacing one's cell phone is a charming eccentricity... my children aren't buying it. ”

A tendency to make metaphorical connections is an occupational hazard for those of us who write. ”

Most of the characters I write with don't think an awful lot about their faith. They're not always questioning the church or feeling confined by the church or rebelling against the church. ”

For me, having characters who are part of a faith then allows me to talk about how that faith either works or fails them without having to attack the institution. ”

The language of the Catholic Church - the liturgy, the prayer, the gospels - was in many ways my first poetry. ”

I think a misconception among many non-religious people is that anyone with a strong faith is, in all ways and at all times, blindly consistent, unwavering, unquestioning. ”

I am not a theologian or a historian, and I feel no call to become a defender of the faith, so in my case, the search for what remains valuable focuses on language itself: Catholic prayer, ritual, the naming of things. ”

I think 'Charming Billy' ultimately is a novel about faith and what we believe in and, above all, what we choose to believe in. ”