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.

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

We didn't have television in those days, and many people didn't even have radios. My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening.

If she can't spell, why is she a librarian? Librarians should know how to spell.

One rainy Sunday when I was in the third grade, I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered that even though I did not want to, I was reading. I have been a reader ever since.

As a child, I disliked books in which children learned to be 'better' children.

With twins, reading aloud to them was the only chance I could get to sit down. I read them picture books until they were reading on their own.