I write in longhand on yellow legal pads.

I don't necessarily start with the beginning of the book. I just start with the part of the story that's most vivid in my imagination and work forward and backward from there.

All her life she had wanted to squeeze the toothpaste really squeeze it,not just one little squirt. [...] The paste coiled and swirled and mounded in the washbasin. Ramona decorated the mound with toothpaste roses as if it was a toothpaste birthday cake

I wanted to be a ballerina. I changed my mind.

I just wrote about childhood as I had known it.

I think the best teachers had a real interest in the subject they were teaching and a love for children.

The key to writing successful YA is to keep the adults out of the story as much as possible.