Children want to do what grownups do.

Today I discovered two kinds of people who go to high school: those who wear new clothes to show off on the first day, and those who wear their oldest clothes to show they think school is unimportant.

She was not a slowpoke grownup. She was a girl who could not wait. Life was so interesting she had to find out what happened next.

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

When I was in the first grade I was afraid of the teacher and had a miserable time in the reading circle, a difficulty that was overcome by the loving patience of my second grade teacher. Even though I could read, I refused to do so.

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.

She means well, but she always manages to do the wrong thing. She has a real talent for it.