“There are other writers who try for subtle and minimalist effects, but I don’t travel with that tribe. I like to make people look up and see me walking the high wire without a net.”

From “The Death of Santini,” by Pat Conroy, my favorite author, whose words are lush and dramatic and completely avoid the modern tendency toward spare, short sentences and stories light on emotion. This is the only type of writing I can understand wanting to do.