Quick James Sallis passage

[yendi]

"I need a detective, Lew. A good one."

"I don't do that anymore. Hell, I never did it very much. I sat in bars and drank, and eventually guys I was looking for would stumble by and trip over my feet. I'm a teacher now."

"And a writer."

"Yeah, well, that too. Once you've lost your pride, it gets easier, you know: you'll do almost any damned thing. You start off small, a piece for the local paper, or maybe this tiny little story about growing up, something like that. That's how they hook you. Then before you know it, you're writing a series for them."

--James Sallis, Moth

He's rapidly becoming one of my favorite contemporary crime writers.