From a Glimmer Train interview with Daniella Lazarin - Danielle Lazarin:
"... I remember advice I received from Dan Chaon while studying fiction at Oberlin. At the end of a semester, he wrote to me: "There's a very specific world that only you can write about, a map that only you can make. This is your book: think about the highways, cities, rivers, state lines that you want to add to your atlas, the people you'd like to be, the situations that draw you in, that scare you and compel you." ...
Dan's advice gave me confidence to pursue the circumstances that interested me, to not belittle my own curiosities, as unexotic and ordinary as they seemed at times. ... Dan's advice reminded me that I didn't need to reach outside my own point of view to make a story interesting. "
"... I remember advice I received from Dan Chaon while studying fiction at Oberlin. At the end of a semester, he wrote to me: "There's a very specific world that only you can write about, a map that only you can make. This is your book: think about the highways, cities, rivers, state lines that you want to add to your atlas, the people you'd like to be, the situations that draw you in, that scare you and compel you." ...
Dan's advice gave me confidence to pursue the circumstances that interested me, to not belittle my own curiosities, as unexotic and ordinary as they seemed at times. ... Dan's advice reminded me that I didn't need to reach outside my own point of view to make a story interesting. "