I also believe that if you're really a writer, you'll write, and that nobody could stop you.

Okay, I thought. Here you are. You are here. And you move forward because that's the way it works; that's the only place u can go. You keep going until it stops hurting, or until you find new things to hurt you worse, I guess. And that is the human condition, all of us lurching along in our own private miseries, because that's the way it is. Because, I guess, God didn't give us any choice. You grow up, I remembered Abigail telling me. You learn.

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

Maybe it stems from my newspaper-reporting days, but I took notes the whole time - getting the call, how I felt. As soon as I put pen to paper, it became a story [Hunger Heart], not something happening to me but something I was recording.

I could have told him that nothing was safe and that no matter how careful you were and how hard you tried, there were still accidents, hidden traps, and snares. You could get killed on an airplane or crossing the street. Your marriage could fall apart when you weren't looking; your husband could lose his job; our baby could get sick or die.

There's something really nice about writing something on Wednesday and watching it being performed live for a studio audience on Tuesday. You never really get that with novels.

I have the best divorce of anyone I've heard of.