I had met many wounded veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center when I was researching my 2009 novel 'The Turnaround,' and I continue to be very interested in how returning servicemen and women deal with their new lives back home and how they're treated by America.

Every young man's best purchase is his first car, which spells freedom. My first one was a '70 Camaro, springtime gold-over-saddle, a 307 with Hi-jackers and chrome reverse mags.

I'm always working on my next novel, even when I'm not.

When I was 19, my dad got sick, and I quit college to take over his business, a coffee shop on 19th Street, below Dupont Circle in D.C. I had been working there since I was 11 years old, so it was not a stretch to think that I could do it, but my record as a teenager, in many respects, was less than stellar.

I never went to school for writing, never took a writing class, but when you're in a room with David Simon and Ed Burns and Dennis Lehane and Richard Price, and they're going over something you've written, you learn what works and what doesn't.

My goal is to get better with each book, and I feel like I am.

There's a room in my house where my stereo, records, CDs, and books are housed. I spend a lot of time in that room, sitting in my chair beside the fireplace, reading and listening to music. Sometimes I just stand before the shelves and look at my books, because every single one of them means something to me.

Incarcerated individuals want what most people want in a novel: good, honest writing and a story well told.

I don't judge anyone of any stripe by what they read. Reading is always good for you. It's a positive act.

It would probably surprise people how prevalent reading is in institutions - and the degree to which some states discourage reading by instituting draconian rules and laws that try to limit and outright roadblock books in prisons.

I even dream about writing. I'm talking seeing words across the page, whole paragraphs.

I didn't want to write the same book over and over.

There's nothing funny about violence. Death is a real thing.

For many years, I did ride-alongs with patrol cops, which is any citizen's right.

There is nothing like the rumble of a dual-piped American car with something under the hood.

I owned a '70 Camaro for many years, which I loved.

I can't relax. I don't have any hobbies.

I never took a writing class.

I was heavily into John D. MacDonald.

My books are not for everybody.

A lot of guys are walking around with a lot simmering beneath the surface, and sometimes it explodes.

My goal is to get a real film industry started in Washington. An actual one, not where features come to town and shoot second unit for a few days. I would love to get something started here. Hire local crews. People could work year-round and raise their families here.

I really feel like people who want to change things need to go out and change it themselves and not look to politicians to do that.

I do miss the Chocolate City of my youth.