I loved him even now, as he took a knife to my throat, as I drowned in blood, as I whispered "Cousin, you were wrong. We were born to live.

Margaret thought of all she knew for certain, that day would always follow night that love was never wasted nor was it lost.

You can be betrayed in your sleep. The whole world can tilt while you're dreaming of butterflies.

But most important of all, she explained that it was all right to say 'No. I disagree.' that was a gift. I understood it was power. The power to think my own thoughts. The power to believe in myself.

All the characters in my books are imagined, but all have a bit of who I am in them - much like the characters in your dreams are all formed by who you are

That is the joy of reading fiction: when all is said and done, the novel belongs to the reader and his or her imagination.

You can try to take sorrow and make it into something enduring, meaningful and beautiful. I always feel guilty that this is my job, that I get to do this