It's sad but true that if you focus your attention on housework and meal preparation and diapers, raising children does start to look like drudgery pretty quickly. On the other hand, if you see yourself as nothing less than your child's nurturer, role model, teacher, spiritual guide, and mentor, your days take on a very different cast.

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

I believe every one of us possesses a fundamental right to tell our own story.

The silence was part of the story I wanted to tell.

Although Salinger had long since cut me out of his life completely and made it plain that he had nothing but contempt for me, the thought of becoming the object of his wrath was more than I felt ready to take on.

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

My job is writing. I get paid to do it. When was the last time you heard someone challenge a doctor for making money off of cancer?