'The Accursed' is very much a novel about social injustice as the consequence of the terrible, tragic division of classes - the exploitation not only of poor and immigrant workers but of their young children in factories and mills - and as the consequence of race hatred in the aftermath of the Civil War and the freeing of the slaves.

A typical biography relying upon individuals' notorious memories and the anecdotes they've invented contains a high degree of fiction, yet is considered 'nonfiction.'

My writing is full of lives I might have led.

As a farm girl, even when I was quite young, I had my 'farm chores' - but I had time also to be alone, to explore the fields, woods and creek side. And to read.

An actress wants to be seen. An actress wants to be loved. By multitudes of people, not just one lone man.

We are the species that clamors to be lied to.

Even as a young child, I was a lover of books and of the spaces in which, as indeed in a sacred temple, books might safely reside.