Category: Essays

...Joan Didion once described keepers of private notebooks as “children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss”

But when I took my first writing class, I was dismayed that the only voice I heard was mine telling me that my previous works had been merely imitative, and that I was really an imposter as a writer with nothing of my own to say. 

He would affix an alarm clock above his head so that if he drifted off to sleep while he was writing, the alarm clock would go off and fall on him. That way he could continue to write even when he was exhausted.

The more you write, the more you learn that writing is like putting flowerpots on a windowsill. There’s order and method to the beauty that people perceive. Ideas need to be watered, structured, and embedded within soil rich with character and intrigue to root the story.

In writing "Hikokimori", I started off with two characters who speak different languages. I played with the idea of how difficult it is to connect with another person, even in your own family, and how connection can be impossible for some people.