I have ten thousand memories of myself writing alone in basements, bizarre servant quarters, cemeteries, deserted fountains, the band van, and other awkward settings.

I wrote my first book in fifth grade. It was about a dog that goes to outer space and is an ambassador for Earth.

After college, I went on a real big classics kick. Read everything by Faulkner, Hemingway, Woolf, Proust, Dostoevsky. And that classics train dropped me off at 'Dracula.' Halfway through it, I understood I'd never be going back, never 'leaving' the genre again. Since then, I've been on a fairly strict horror diet.

Most apocalyptic fiction makes it very clear that it's the end of the world. But 'Bird Box' hasn't convinced me of that. Is 'Bird Box' instead a suburban neurotic nightmare? I don't think so. But it's fun to consider.