My mother was a cracker jack typist. And she would come in and sit at my house and type the final type script before I would then send it to the publisher. And it was nice for us.

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.

I hate first drafts, and it never gets easier. People always wonder what kind of superhero power they'd like to have. I wanted the ability for someone to just open up my brain and take out the entire first draft and lay it down in front of me so I can just focus on the second, third and fourth drafts.

you can't deny they ever happened. You can't deny you ever loved them, love them still, even if loving them causes you pain

I am certainly a fearful person, but fearless in my writing. So there's that other person inside.

My husband says I have too much imagination, but I don't think a writer can have too much imagination!

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