My primary mission is to tell stories that challenge the reader—realist, grounded, everyday stories that discomfit and unnerve while refraining from merely causing offense. I write fiction that embraces conflict without manufacturing it. I don’t seek to shock or titillate for the sake of drama, but I also refuse to pander or capitulate to trends, critics, and admirers alike. As in life, in my stories I typically unite unlike characters on the page to see what happens as their souls collide in a contained space. My secondary mission is to bridge the gap between the life I live as a striving, toiling human and the grand notions that occupy my mind, be they an image, line of dialogue, plot line, or a snippet of prose that demands to be explored. I write to explore who I am as a citizen of the era of pandemics, collective outrage, and digitalism. I write both to connect to the world and to comment on it from afar. Ultimately, my mission is to become a better human through the perfection of my craft.