“It's always terrible when you realize that you've married the wrong book.” — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
That's how I work, whether with stories or novels - they start with an image that comes to me in a daydream,… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
I read a lot, but at the same time I'm not a particularly good or diligent or discriminating reader. I go through… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
A novel requires a certain kind of world building and also a certain kind of closure, ultimately. Whereas with a short story… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
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 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 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 have to admit that most of the time I read in the same way that I smoke and chew gum and… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
For me, the process of writing a novel happens mostly in your head before you actually start writing. — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
In some ways all of my fiction is like a conversation I'm having with the writers I read when I was first… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
My main reader was my wife Sheila, and I haven't written a lot since she died. — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
A novel requires a certain kind of world-building and also a certain kind of closure, ultimately. Whereas with a short story you… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
I think at a certain point the book develops a certain weight, or pressure. You've been pushing the rock up the hill… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
The thing that made me turn more towards writing was realizing how hard it was going to be to get a singular… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
Even when our death is imminent, we carry the image of ourselves moving forward, alive, into the future. — Dan Chaon 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 much but… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“It's hard to believe that this is how it's done. That this is how we get here into the world, by accident or design,… — Dan Chaon 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 like the… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“I have to admit that most of the time I read in the same way that I smoke and chew gum and jiggle my… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“Outside, the sleet had gotten thicker. You could hear it pebbling against the large glass windows, you could see it swirling wildly through the… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
I was worried that, as a college teacher, if I wrote too much about intergenerational sex my students would be creeped out. — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
Plot and scene are still the hardest things for me, though I think they're the building blocks of what makes a story work. — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“I've been talking to myself a lot lately. I don't know what that's about, but my mother was the same way. She hated to… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
“Your Mom's Car. Think about that. Try to wrap your brain around the supernatural and spiritual implications that the name bears down you. Your… — Dan Chaon 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 human eyeballs… — Dan Chaon Copy Share Image
