Maybe life was like a sea, and all the people were like boats ... Everybody who was born was cast into the sea. Winds would blow them in all directions. Tides would rise and turn, in their own rhythm. And the boats - they just went along as best they could, trying to find a harbor.

By the time I started high school, I knew I wanted to be a writer. After graduating from Smith College in Massachusetts, I moved to New York City and worked for the advertising agency J. Walter Thompson.

She looked at her hand: Just some hand, holding a cheap pen. Some girls’ hand. She had nothing to do with that hand. Let that hand do whatever it wanted to.

Rebellion is necessary for development of character.

Even the bad books I write are satisfying. I'm my least critical reader.

I love teaching; I love little kids.

I didnt write anything at all except book reports until I was in seventh grade, and then I wrote mostly poetry for myself.