I think of myself as a realistic writer, not a creator of soap opera or melodrama.

There is a theme that runs through my work, and that is: the toxic property of keeping secrets.

It's not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can't tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself.

I do not outline. There are writers I know and count as my friends who certainly do it the other way but for me part of the adventure is not knowing how it's going to turn out.

I had known there had been a serial killer on Mount Tamalpais, and it felt so incongruous in such a beautiful, peaceful spot.

Every child, woman, and man should possess license to speak or sing in his or her true voice.

She felt everything too deeply, it was like the world was too much for her.