For most of my adult life I have been a working writer. My books include novels, story collections, and a couple of non-fiction works. In 1991 The Lost Language of Cranes was made into a BBC film with Brian Cox, Eileen Atkins, Angus McFadyen, and Corey Parker. In 2002 the Spanish director Ventura Pons adapted my novel The Page Turner into the film Food of Love with Juliet Stevenson, Paul Rhys, Allan Corduner, Geraldine McEwan, and Kevin Bishop. The Indian Clerk is currently in development as a film to be produced by Scott Rudin. In the 1990s I co–wrote a screenplay with the late John Schlesinger entitled Someone’s Son. It was never produced.

At different points in my career I have been the recipient of fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Institute for Catalan Letters in Barcelona, Spain. In 1994 I was named a Literary Lion by the New York Public Library. Since 1990 I have been a member of the usage panel for The American Heritage Dictionary.