Personally, I have never wished I were a male novelist.

It is not a camera, or a reporter that makes something real and genuine; more often a camera or a reporter does the opposite.

And an unstable childhood makes you appreciate calmness and not crave excitement. To spend a Saturday afternoon mopping your kitchen floor while listening to opera on the radio, and to go that night to an Indian restaurant with a friend and be home by nine o'clock - these are enough. They are gifts.

I'm able to separate fiction and reality. I guess it remains to be seen if other people are.

I do think I was trying to entertain the reader more than I was trying to purge myself.

There are people we treat wrong and later, we're prepared to treat other people right.

I wanted my life to start - but in those rare moments when it seemed like something might actually change, panic shot through me.