I am something of an aficionado of thrift stores. In my youth, I regularly searched their shelves for old books.

Most scholarly books we read for the information or insight they contain. But some we return to simply for the pleasure of the author's company.

At any given moment, I've always assumed that nearly everyone around me was smarter than I was, more naturally gifted, quicker-witted, and probably capable of understanding Heidegger and Derrida.

Young people looking for adventure fiction now generally turn to fantasy, but for those of a certain age, the spy thriller has long been the escape reading of choice.

I've been lucky enough to meet a lot of fantastic people, from royalty to rock stars. I've also been known to be a bit of a daredevil, so I've tried to explore extreme travel and adventure - scuba-diving in an arctic glacier and camping in the Himalayas.

Fast Food Nation' isn't about my journey into the dark world of fast food and the prison book is not about my journey into the prison world. I'm not using myself as any kind of narrative link.

Life is an unfoldment, and the further we travel the more truth we can comprehend. To understand the things that are at our door is the best preparation for understanding those that lie beyond.

In Japan, there's a TV series called Jin. It deals with time travel. I like stories about time travel. It's a story about people living in modern day that travel back to the Edo era. Those things really interest me.