Sure, on a larger scale, it was healthy to have people out there you cared about more than yourself. She knew that. But then there was the abject fear you would lose it. They say possessions own you. Not so. Loved ones own you. You are forever held hostage once you care so much.

Sometimes even when the book is over I dont know whos good and whos bad. Its really more interesting, I think, to write about gray characters than it is to write about black and white.

Hope is cruel. Hope reminds me of what almost was. Hope makes the physical ache return.

William Goldman's Marathon Man was a novel that taught me about suspense. I was maybe 16 years old when I read it and I remember thinking, "You could put a gun to my head and I wouldn't put this book down." I loved that feeling - and want to give it others.

When I was seventeen, I worked as a counsellor at a co-ed sleep-away camp for eight weeks. I loved it but it could be harrowing - it was far too much responsibility for someone my age.

I'm not very happy idle. There's always this voice in my head that says, 'I should be writing.

I'd never had money growing up, and it's never been that important to me, except maybe to take our kids on a nice vacation or something like that.