I think any writer keeps going back to some basic theme. Sometimes it's autobiographical. I guess it usually is.
I knew Berlin would have to become a kind of character in my new book, 'In the Garden of Beasts'. I had felt likewise about Chicago when I wrote 'The Devil in the White City' and Galveston with 'Isaac's Storm'.
When you've written long enough, you see that there's a common theme in your work.
I try and relate my writing to something I know about, and I had a primary experience of being in a competitive, military environment and being part of a squadron.
Anything that happens to you has some bearing upon what you write.
All of my writing has guitars behind it, even the novels.
I don't think writers really choose their subjects. I think the subjects, the topics, the themes, choose us, and then we make the most of what we have. For Trollope, society; for Roth, Jews. For me, apparently, love. Why hide it?
I write about things that scare me. I've never written a snake story in my life. I myself have never written a story about snakes because they don't scare me. I write about rats because they scare the hell out of me.
As long as there's a strong theme that I can identify with, that's what makes me interested in writing.
I've realized that I will probably write about teenagers and that time in people's lives - I'll probably come back to it a lot.
The odd thing is, that I wrote The Great Spring while I had cancer and it's not about cancer. It was after I was done with cancer that I wrote a book about it.
