Everyone has sorrow. Everyone has obligations. Everyone keeps going. You lean on the people who love you. You do the best you can, and you keep going.

Being a novelist is hard for anyone - male or female. You don't get to quit your day job.

I don't think any writer chooses what his or her work is called.

This is motherhood for you,' said my own mother. 'Going through life with your heart outside your body.

She thought of what it would be like to grow up without the one certainty that every baby deseved - when I'm hurt or cold or scared, someone will come and care for me - and how that absence could warp you so that you'd lash out at the people you loved, driving them away when all you wanted to do was pull them closer.

I get really starstruck and tongue tied when I'm around other writers and the conversation tends not to go well.

I've learned that some broken things stay broken, and I've learned that you can get through bad times and keep looking for better ones, as long as you have people who love you.