Even more than getting compliments on social media, what I love is when some random stranger says something very funny or insightful about my books, often in 140 characters or less! It's a very casual, low-stakes, non-burdensome way of connecting that I think is fun for both the writer and the reader. And there are a lot of clever people out there who have no connection to publishing.

Of course, I didn't imagine then that I could have had a real relationship with any guy. I thought that by virtue of being me I was disqualified.

Obviously the bar is much higher now for a behavior to be scandalous. Social media has really changed the way people live. It's not a new impulse; it's just being enacted in a new way.

Being raised in an unstable household makes you understand that the world doesn't exist to accommodate you, which... is something a lot of people struggle to understand well into their adulthood. It makes you realize how quickly a situation can shift, how danger really is everywhere. But crises when the occur, do not catch you off guard; you have never believed you lived under a shelter of some essential benevolence. And an unstable childhood makes you appreciate calmness and not crave excitement.

To be a person who sees a political ad on television and takes the statements in it as fact, how can you exist in this world? How is it you're not robbed daily by charlatans who knock at your door?

I gave people the benefit of the doubt, thinking, so many people that appear very calm and even boring must have all these wild emotions and crazy ideas.

I'm not afraid of writing about sensitive subjects, but I want to be careful how I do so and I know not all readers will think I have been, of course.