The mers were also designed to reproduce only at long intervals, in order to maintain the natural balance of the environment in which they were placed.

The contradictions are what make human behavior so maddening and yet so fascinating, all at the same time.

Probably I chose immortality because mortality is a universal human obsession.

I was thinking about what I wanted to write next, after my first novel, and had decided that I wanted to write a story with a lot of strong female characters in it.

These days too many of us seem inclined to cover our ears, close our eyes, and blindly follow the most narrow, conservative tenets of religion or else seek comfort in the ancient traditions of New Age ritual.

As for the historical inspirations I drew on in writing The Snow Queen, I suppose I would call them more cross-cultural inspirations, though they frequently involve past societies as well as present day ones.

Here was a fragment of Goddess myth that, through all its permutations, had somehow escaped being turned on its head. It was the perfect springboard for the sort of novel I wanted to write.