I met Ray Charles at 14, and he was 16. But he was like a hundred years older than me.
I grew up listening to a lot of Ray Charles and '60s rock, thanks to my father, and then my brothers got me in to KISS and whatnot, so I guess that's where I got my first taste for music.
I'm proud of my mentors. Ray Charles is the strongest influence on me as a singer.
I met a 13-year-old black child, Raymond, who had never been to school and had never learnt any words, yet it seemed to me that he was intelligent. It became apparent after a short period that Raymond thought in terms of visual signs and movements.
The sun rays are more powerful at high altitudes and the snow bounces the rays right back up at you. Shiseido sun care products are epic for protecting me and not irritating my skin.
Experience has taught me, when I am shaving of a morning, to keep watch over my thoughts, because, if a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act.
I remember 'The Shepherd's Dog' record being not necessarily a political record, but a reaction to socio-political situations in America. And it didn't manifest itself as protest or propaganda songs, but there's a lot of surreal imagery that was born out of really me being surprised Bush got re-elected in '04.
When my father was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 1991, I asked him if he had any regrets, and he said no. I was a burnt-out litigation solicitor in my thirties, hating my life, and his cancer made me re-evaluate it all.
My favorite movie of all-time is 'Stand By Me,' and I re-read my favorite young adult books often.
In re-reading 'Presumed Innocent,' the one thing that struck me - and I re-read the book four different times in writing 'Innocent,' interested in different things each time - but I did think there were a couple of extra loops in the plot that I probably didn't need. The other thing that sort of amazed me was how discursive the book was.
I've always been interested in the Greek tragedies. A few years back, I re-read a translation of the 'The Oresteia,' and that stayed with me, and slowly this idea of using some of those old legends and plays to tell a new story about modern urban life began to form.
A Boosh fan bought me an original copy of 'The Jungle Book' - like, the first print from 1894 - so I've just started re-reading that and am really enjoying it. But the last book I read in its entirety was 'Willard and his Bowling Trophies,' by Richard Brautigan, which is amazing.
Shakespeare is renewed each time you see it or read it. I've seen 'Midsummer Night's Dream' so many times, and each time it's a little different, or a different line leaps out at me. It's like re-reading a good book over and over, always noticing something you hadn't seen the time before - and that's rare.
The only thing that I've really noticed in my own experience is just people kind of saying that a woman, when they react to something exciting, 'Oh, that's a masculine way of reacting.' And to me, that's absurd. It's like, that's how humans - they get excited, and you yell, and you jump, and you flex. That's what you do.
I work on stretched linen canvas, sized so that the surface already has a sense of tension when I begin. It is a very rich and reactive surface. I begin by drawing on the canvas with a kind of loose line, very simply and freely. I paint very thinly, which allows me to change the drawing if I want to.
I think social media is... really cool in the sense that I don't think that a writer like me would've found a readership if maybe Instagram wasn't there.
Readers would email me and say, 'Please write a novel about so-and-so,' but it has to come from yourself and not so much from your readership.
Going to so many book events keeps me connected with my readership while constantly reminding me that all the long hours at the drawing desk are worthwhile.
Music comes to me more readily than words.
My parents are professors; they're intellectual. I spent a lot of time reading books. To me, everyone always looks like they do in your imagination. And in my imagination, the characters always looked like me.
