When I was writing my first two books I was also freelancing and teaching and doing other odd jobs.

I guess because twins have this mystique, and triplets - I think the normal sibling connection potentially can be very powerful, and there's this idea that it's even more powerful. It really is, not just someone like me, but another version of me.

I have this theory that the likeability question comes up so much more with female characters created by female authors than it does with male characters and male authors

I'm SO trying to give up meat.

I have always found the times when another person recognizes you to be strangely sad; I suspect the pathos of these moments is their rareness, the way they contrast with most daily encounters. That reminder that it can be different, that you need not go through your life unknown but that you probably still will--that is the part that's almost unbearable.

Well, I think in my first two novels, both the characters are pretty neurotic, which I would say that I am.

She really does like him, she likes lying next to him, she wants to be around him; when you get down to it, can you say that about many people?