With domestic adoption, you get a form, you fill it out, and there are these boxes: African-American, African-American and Hispanic, and you check the boxes that you're comfortable with. Race is completely open in that regard.

Publishing in a way doesn't have a lot to do with writing, and writing doesn't have a lot to do with publishing.

My father is an economist who specialized in foreign food policy, and my mother worked for AID, a branch of the State Department, so food in regards to world affairs was talked about a lot.

I find I have to touch what I am working on every day, or a deep-seated dread kicks in that is very hard to overcome.

History releases me from my own experience and jogs my fictional imagination.

My first two novels were set in the past, and that freed me up in a lot of ways; it allowed me to find my way into my story and my characters through research.

The past always sort of haunts us and perhaps inspires us in some ways.