This may be a little bit of a provocative thing to say, but the memoirist doesn't owe the reader anything other than a good story and the inclining of the mind in the direction of memory. Of course, the memoirist is not allowed to make things up. But the really skilled memoirist knows what to leave in and what to leave out to serve the story. In autobiography you can't do that.

Part of my spiritual work is learning to live with the knowledge that we can't protect our loved ones from pain and heartache.

Success is so fleeting, even if you get a good book deal or your book is a huge success, there's always the fear: What about the next one?

If we grew up with nothing, we're complicated with that. That's the thing I keep hearing from people.

I do strongly identify with being Jewish. I was raised Orthodox and had a childhood complicated by the fact that my father was deeply religious and my mother was not.

You have to believe in yourself before the world has given you any indication that you should believe in yourself as a writer.

It's not gender-specific, but I do think it's women who tend to start having that sort of little whispering voice of "I want more here" and "I want more for my family."