But what truly horsey girls discover in the end is that boyfriends, husbands, children, and careers are the substitute-for horses

Well, in fact everybody - everybody - in the entire nation has enough stuff in their life to write about that's interesting that they could write their autobiography. And in the end that's why I find people interesting.

Ignorance is a self-generating state of mind; one of its characteristics is that it doesn't recognize itself as ignorance.

In many ways, being honest about 'Huckleberry Finn' goes right to the heart of whether we can be honest about our heritage and our identity as Americans.

People with good intentions never give up!

Before I write a novel, images float around in my head that work like icons - they are meaningless in themselves, but serve as reminders.

With any novel that you begin, you can't foresee how difficult or easy it's going to be, and you can't really prepare yourself. You just have a take it one step at a time and know that it's all right to keep going - you can always fix it.