[When I was a kid] I was a surgeon, amputating legs and arms of my paper dolls. And I had a little board with little tacks that I would tack them down to do this.

There's no book or play or series or anything that speaks to everyone, because then it wouldn't speak to anyone.

We are friends for life. When we’re together the years fall away. Isn’t that what matters? To have someone who can remember with you? To have someone who remembers how far you’ve come?

Like my mother said, you can't go back to holding hands

I was sick all the time, one exotic illness after another, which lasted throughout my twenties. My worst decade. But from the day the first book was accepted, I never got sick again. Writing changed my life.

Something will be offensive to someone in every book, so you've got to fight it.

I fell in love with books at the Elizabeth Public Library when I was four.