I usually have more than one thing I'm working on at once - I've been working on three different novels. When I… — Dan Chaon Books Copy Share Image
The thing that grounds you, and the thing that really gives you a sense of wholeness, is your family, friends and your… — Dan Chaon Community Copy Share Image
Imaginative empathy is one of the great gifts that humans have, and it means that we can live more than one life.… — Dan Chaon Compassion Copy Share Image
“This was what real grief felt like—she had never truly felt it before. All the times she had been sad, all the… — Dan Chaon Death Copy Share Image
Julie Orringer is the real thing, a breathtaking chronicler of the secrets and cruelties underneath the surface of middle-class American life. These… — Dan Chaon American life Copy Share Image
“the professor talking about eigengrau—intrinsic gray, brain gray. It was the color you “saw” when light was totally absent, a kind of… — Dan Chaon Color Copy Share Image
When I was younger I was attracted to people who had that kind of artifice - people who were incredibly polished and… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“Let us say that this, all of this, has a logic to it. We understand each other, don't we? Are we not,… — Dan Chaon Logic Copy Share Image
For the last few years I've tried to force myself to write at least one page every day, which doesn't sound like… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“How good it felt to be alone, stacking blocks. That's what came to him again, a kind of weight solidifying in his… — Dan Chaon Self Copy Share Image
Sometimes he thinks that if he could only trace the path of his life carefully enough, everything would become clear. The ways… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“Her name...was Mrs. marina Orlova, and she had grown up in Siberia. Later, she would tell him that she loathed the American… — Dan Chaon Customs Copy Share Image
I also have just my own limits about stuff. I'm not interested in writing graphically about sexual assault for example. I feel… — Dan Chaon Bleakness Copy Share Image
I can't understand how people can settle for having just one life. I remember we were in English class and we were… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
Writing short stories was kind of like I was cheating the whole time, in some way. I went back and forth between… — Dan Chaon Books Copy Share Image
The kind of person I find myself interested in is a cross between being very emotionally complex and very immature. That's what… — Dan Chaon Complexes Copy Share Image
I've had a lot of different lives. I was adopted, I grew up in Nebraska, and then I went to Northwestern... Then… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“You want a child because it is a link in the bridge that you are building between the past and the future,… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“There is your car and the open road, the fabled lure of random adventure. You stand at the verge, and you could… — Dan Chaon Adventure Copy Share Image
I like to sleep about four or five really solid hours at night, and then sometimes take a nap in the afternoon… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“It’s called apophenia. It’s the tendency we humans have to find meaning in disconnected information. For example, some people believe in what’s… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“As her husband held her close, she could feel the pulse of other choices, other lives, opening up beneath her. Her past… — Dan Chaon Heart Copy Share Image
I knew I wanted to play around with genre-esque imagery, and the identity theft stuff came in the middle, when I was… — Dan Chaon Character Copy Share Image
You can't count on notoriety lasting very long, and there's no way to predict whether anyone will care about your books or… — Dan Chaon Book Copy Share Image
“We leave such a trail of bodies through our teens and twenties that it's hard to tell which one is us. How… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
I guess I'm curious about how people process grief and how they process loss. And I'm also interested in the ways in… — Dan Chaon Consequence Copy Share Image
I keep a daily journal of whatever weird thought comes into my mind, like when I had a dream I was in… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
I feel like I go back and forth between being fairly fatalistic and really more hopeful about the possibilities of things changing.… — Dan Chaon Election Copy Share Image
“This is one of those things that you can never explain to anyone; that's what I want to explain - one of… — Dan Chaon Connections Copy Share Image
I guess I've been blessed with insomnia because I do a lot of my writing at night. Because I don't sleep as… — Dan Chaon Blessed Copy Share Image
“He pictures amputated human arms flopping like fish down the center of the road; syringes floating on beds of liposuctioned fat; gelatinous… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
The feeling of being an outsider, and the identity theme, are hardwired into me. If there's anything really autobiographical in my fiction,… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
