I don't base my books on my life (thank goodness) and I don't pick the topic first. In fact, the topic picks me - via a question I can't answer as a mom, a wife, a woman, an American. I find myself wondering "What if..." and it blossoms into a whole novel.

But will you miss me? More importantly - will I miss you? Does either one of us really want to hear the answer to that question?

I am always consulted about covers, and give feedback, but I am also aware that what causes a customer to pick a book up off a shelf in the UK is very different from what causes a customer to pick a book up in the US.

In the custom of mourning, the fabric of the night had been ripped, revealing a star at each tiny tear.

She had loved him. He knew this; he had never doubted it. But she had also asked him to kill her. If you love someone that much, you did not lay that sort of burden on him for the rest of his life.

When a freedom is taken away from you, I suppose, you recognize it as a privilege, not a right.

Was there a language of loss? Did everyone who suffered speak a different dialect?