You are a human animal.

You are a very special breed,

or you are the only animal.

Who can think, who can reason, who can read.

Hi, this is Michael Silverblad, and this is Bookworm.

I'm here today with Anne Rice. It's my great pleasure to have her here.

She's the author most recently of The Witching Hour.

I daren't say that she's the author of interview with the vampire, the vampire

Lestat, the Queen of the Dam, the Mummy, theast of All Saints, and cry to heaven, because everyone knows that.

I guess I wanted to start by asking or saying, you know, your style, the writing style strikes me as being like a pizza with everything on it, but everything including bat wings and ground glass and

orchids. Where did that style come from?

Oh, I loved what you just said about bat wings and ground glass and orchids. That's wonderful.

I don't know how to answer that question. It certainly is the style that's natural to me,

and it feels like an outpouring when I write.

It feels like turning on a fire hose, perhaps feels.

I would say it's Southern, it's Irish Catholic, it's sensuous, because writing for me is a matter of trying to describe often the sensuous experience

on all different levels, it's all of those things put together. I grew up Irish Catholic in the

South, and that means growing up surrounded by marvelous storytellers who know just how to time

the climax of any simple story,

whether it's at the dinner table or on the front porch, you know.

And I think the vocabulary in the South is particularly rich and vivid.

But you months have mentioned in an interview that you feel like a 19th century novelist,

...