I think my stubbornness has served me well. I just knew at an early age what I wanted to do and I was determined to be able to make it happen, no matter how long it took.

Writers are magpies, and we collect details about people and we use them for fictional characters.

A lot of people hurl themselves into relationships to lose themselves, but I think the best relationships help us to be more ourselves, to bring forth our best selves.

I was a bookworm who aced every test - until third grade, when my teacher handed out a pop quiz about Jesus and the Apostles.

I just love that feeling of being in another world, of creating characters and watching where they go.

I have to admit that many of the relationships I write about are destructive, but that's the yin to the yang of a good relationship. Maybe you have to experience the terrible ones to appreciate the good unions!

When you love what you do, it stops seeming like work and instead becomes necessity.