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'.
Anything that happens to you has some bearing upon what you write.
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.
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?
All of my writing has guitars behind it, even the novels.
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.
