–February 23, 2010: The Boston Globe: Tremblay says that Boston kindles his imagination as a writer because it offers “this odd mix of quaint and big city that I think is compelling,’’ adding: “When you throw into it the massive history – from the Revolution to busing – you can feel the weight that Boston has.’’
–February 2, 2010: HTML Giant (with Nick Antosca): And once, during an overnight sleep study in a hospital, with electrodes and the like hooked up to my head and chest, I dreamt that squirrels were coming out of the walls and attacking me. I held my ground though, because in my dreams, I’m a hero.
–January 24, 2010: The Big Adios (with Tom Piccirilli): Genre-mixing or hopping reflects my own personal tastes as both a writer and a reader. I got my fiction writing start with horror/SF short stories, so I’ve always been drawn to stuff that’s dark but also just a little bit off or strange. I’ve told people—somewhat tongue-in-cheek—that I wrote a mystery novel with a horror attitude, by which I mean that reality wasn’t reality and anything could happen at any time and the reader wouldn’t ever be or feel safe. Which, I know, is kind of bullshit. That ‘not-safe’ description could just as easily be a descriptor of noir fiction, or any fiction for that matter. So…
–June 10, 2009. Sybil’s Garage No. 6: With The Little Sleep and it’s follow up, I’ve had to to plot/outline more beforehand by necessity. I’m not good enough to make up the mystery element on the fly. I used to (and still enjoy writing this way) sketch out a character and plop the poor sap in a few scenes to see where the mess might take me. For The Little Sleep, I had wrote 10 page synopsis before going back to that first chapter and adding to it. I didn’t necessarily enjoy it. Ah, heck, I hate plotting and outlining. I’m much more interested in character building. But the outlining was a good exercise and extremely helpful for this particular project.
–May 10, 2009. Punktalk (the blog of author Jeffrey Thomas): There’s a good word: rearranged. Each day for Mark is a rearrangement of what he knows about himself and the world around him.
–April 5, 2009. Bookslut (with Geoffrey H. Goodwin): The idea of writing a PI novel — a genre that celebrates order and the lucid piecing together of clues to ultimately reveal truths and black-and-white conclusions — that blurs the lines of reality and embraces ambiguity appealed to me. I started with Mark Genevich being the anti-private dick: not calm-cool-collected, not handsome, and not at all well-suited for his choice of career (and does he really even have a career?). As the novel progressed, I think Mark and his narcolepsy became much more complex, and hopefully, more compelling.
–March 27, 2009. Fear Zone (with Nick Kaufmann): I have no personal experience with narcolepsy, but during the mid-to-late 90s I actually suffered from a sleep disorder: sleep apnea. There was a solid two-to-three year stretch when I never really got a good night’s sleep because I would stop breathing, and then would wake up, gasping for breath. Not fun.
–March 25, 2009. Omnivoracious (with Jeff Vandermeer): The South Boston setting has generated a larger, more visceral response than I anticipated.
–March 23, 2009. The Page 69 Test: Pg 69 is the last page of the eleventh chapter. That clearly means something.
–September 15, 2008. Diet Soap Interview (with Doug Lain) : Okay, fine, last words: “If it matters, if you care about such things, I didn’t try to hurt anyone on purpose.”
–May 27, 2008. Interviewed by Charles Tan: I wish I was a basketball pro. I can shoot very well; but I’m short on strength, quickness, and all around athleticism.
