I don't think we [with Kate DiCamillo] intended to write a book about friendship, I think we intended to write a book about two friends.

Our rule was that we [with Kate DiCamillo] would write everything together, literally every word.

Water seeks its own level. Look at them. The Tigris, the Euphrates, the Mississippi, the Amazon, the Yangtze. The world's great rivers. And every one of them finds its way to the ocean.

Wouldn't want to miss a war, would I?

We'd decided to write a book about two friends. I gave her some coffee and then we sat there not knowing what to do. How do you start writing a book together? So Kate [DiCamillo] got up after about 10 minutes into this endeavor, and said, 'Well, that was fun,' and started to head out the door. I said, 'Wait, wait, wait, no no no,' because I'm a bit more patient.

Your heart literally hurts when it's breaking. You can feel it, every beat another ache, and nothing you can do will stop it, either from beating or breaking.

I suppose, the natural outgrowth about writing about two friends, it becomes about their friendship, and the complexities of it, and the way personality plays off each other, and what they each like to do, separately and together.