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It’s got to be hard being one of the most beloved authors in the United States. And by hard I mean pretty easy.

Take Michael Chabon, he’s recently been the first guest editor of the hip literary quarterly McSweeney’s, seen one of his books get turned into a hit movie (“Wonder Boys”) and another win the Pulitzer Prize in 2001 (“The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay”). His latest release “Summerland” tackled childhood and the American myth. The world may be on the brink of war and the most turmoil since the end of the Cold War, but Chabon is interested in talking about kids, comics and writing screenplays. He did just that at Royce Hall on Sunday night, as part of UCLA Performing Arts’ Spoken Word Series.

The night began with Chabon reading an essay-type piece lamenting the loss of freedom and imaginative space allowed to the current generation’s children. He read in a gentle, even fatherly, voice. The essay was both poignant and funny – it was a solid well thought-out piece of prose. Basically, it was pleasant. Like many passages in Chabon’s fiction, the essay was warm, nice, enjoyable and entirely unspectacular. If the reading was a bath, it would have been lukewarm.

When he finished reading and the applause died down, Chabon asked for the house lights to be turned on and took questions from whomever was willing to raise their hand. The questions mostly centered on the aforementioned childhood essay and some audience members’ embarrassing fixation on “Kavalier and Clay.” Chabon handled the questions deftly, playing on a quick innocent humor and personalizing many of the ideas in his essay with self-deprecating examples from his own parenting experience. He also fielded a couple questions about his work on screenplays, which includes a script version of “Kavalier and Clay,” and a stab at the script for “The Amazing Spiderman.” Chabon said that, while scriptwriting takes up time he sometimes thinks might be better devoted to other literature, it helps pay the bills.

If the talk was any indication, then Chabon will continue to produce well-told fiction that is both engaging and pleasing to a wide audience. As for riding high on his wave of success, he gets to write all day long and then tour around and talk to people who adore his writing. It might not be a demanding gig, but he certainly seemed happy to do it.

After the question-and-answer session, much of the audience rushed out of the hall while the applause was still in full swing. They were trying to be the first ones in line to get their books signed in Royce’s west lobby.