His bar, Beer People, has been in operation since March 2024 and is located in downtown Budapest. It specializes in rare and high-quality beer.


1. When did you arrive in Hungary and what brought you here?

I’ve been in Budapest since 2014. I came here from Prague because I’d been writing a novel, and, in the year I spent working on it, I’d succeeded only in drinking five Czech beers a day. My girlfriend thought it was having a deleterious effect on my personality. She wanted to move to Jakarta, but I had already lived in Asia and didn’t want to go back. I got her to agree to Budapest. By the time she finally did move, we had adopted a dog and moved into a cozy little apartment in District XIII. I kept the dog and the apartment.

2. What’s your book about?

It’s called Visegrad: A Novel. It’s about a group of expatriates in a fictional country, where the national sport is pretending to work hard while doing nothing. Theoretically, I’m a humorist.

2. Have you been an expatriate elsewhere?

I lived for a year in Suwon, Korea and two years (on and off) in Prague.

3. What surprised you most about Hungary?

How the crushing weight of history makes people pessimistic. We don’t have a lot of history where I’m from, which leaves us free to believe in our dreams and to extol the virtues of human kindness, etc. 

4. Friends are in Budapest for the weekend - what must they absolutely see and do?

They should visit my bar, Beer People, have a coffee and browse books in Massolit, catch a movie at Bem Mozi. They should go for long urban walks along the rakpart, into Gellért Hill and the castle, preferably ending at Déryné where the kitchen is open extremely late and the food is extremely good. The main thing you have to do in Budapest is to be out in it, let it put on a show.

5. Why did you open a bar?

When my daughter arrived, I panicked. I felt I needed a more stable source of income than novel writing. Luckily, after ten years of being a novelist, I had learned a lot about beer. We opened Beer People near the National Opera House, on Lázár Street. I originally wanted it to be more of an import beer store or bottle shop. We import cans from New England and the West Coast, as well as from select breweries around Europe. Then I hoped it would be a beer hall. We sell kegged lagers from Germany and the Czech Republic, and ales from Hungarian micro-breweries. Ultimately, it became the sort of place people could go to drink a nice beer while they read a book or work on a manuscript.

6. What is your favorite Hungarian food?

Erdélyi rakott káposzta. In my opinion, if you’re living in Budapest and aren’t getting large, delicious lunches at the étkezdék, yours is a life half lived.

7. What is your favourite Hungarian word?

Pufók because it makes you look pufók when you say it.

9. What career other than yours would you love to pursue?

I would love to be a high-level claims adjuster back in the States. You get to travel all over America, learn an enormous amount about an industry, and then put that knowledge into practice. I fell into conversation with a claims adjuster when I was on book tour, and I realized that he was one of the happiest, most interesting people I’d ever met. He was very well-adjusted. 

10. What's a job you would definitely never want?

One of my friends, a neuroscientist, was responsible for cutting the heads off hundreds of lab mice; that always seemed particularly hellish. I do not think I would have thrived as a police officer or as a member of the United States Armed Forces.

11. Where did you spend your last vacation?

Istria, the northernmost province of Croatia. It is unbelievably beautiful. I love Rovinj and Poreč, but I love the ruins and hill forts of the lush interior more.

12. Where do you hope to spend your next holiday?

I would like to go to Istanbul. I’m embarrassed that I haven’t been yet.

13. Apart from temptation what can't you resist?

Editing a piece of writing until it’s ‘just right’, which, of course, it never is. I was the editor of a literary magazine called Panel here for five years, and the work tapped into a deeply compulsive side of my personality.

14. What was your favourite band, film, or hobby as a teen?

I loved Apocalypse Now when I was a kid. I started watching it around the time I turned twelve. I think it was how the weirdness of the script contrasted with its classical structural backbone; there is an ancient story-form called anabasis, which means ‘to follow a river to its origin’. I had already read Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad, and I bought the Redux on DVD. I watched it over and over. I would watch it as I fell asleep. I must have watched it a hundred times before I left for college.

15. Red or white?

West Coast IPA, preferably with Simcoe,  'though I enjoy all the classic 'C-hops': Cascade, Centennial, Columbus, Chinook and Citra.

16. Books or films?

Books. There is nothing like a great book. Also, reading makes me feel good.

17. Morning person or night person?

My life is organized around not having to accomplish anything before noon. That became more difficult with the arrival of my daughter, Virginia. My wife is a morning person (thank God) and is a very sweet, understanding woman. I would recommend marrying her if you ever get the chance, though I will probably do my best to stop you.

18. Which social issue do you feel most strongly about?

Environmentalism and conspiracy theories. I hate conspiracy theories.

19. Buda or Pest?

Pest. 'I think Víziváros and Lágymányos are cool', but I’ve lived in Újlipótváros for about 80% of my time here. I left at one point, then moved back. I can’t imagine living anywhere else. Plus, when an expat moves to Buda you seldom hear from them again.

20. What would you say is your personal motto? 

There’s a Latin motto in Larry McMurtry’s epic, Lonesome Dove. The motto is “UVA UVAM VIVENDO VARIA FIT." It’s a corruption of another phrase and translates to: ‘A grape ripens beside another grape,’ which is meant to articulate something about the nature of sharing your life with other people. In the book, it is written beside the phrase ‘We Don’t Rent Pigs,’ which I have found to be equally true.