The best books come from someplace deep inside.... Become emotionally involved. If you don't care about your characters, your readers won't either.

I don't really know exactly how it happened but I don't like the idea that I would ever have said I'm going to write about racism or puberty or bullying.

Without peanut butter, I might starve.

I was Little Miss Perfect. That's where all the secrets come in, because you know damn well you are not perfect, but you think your parents want you to be. And so you pretend.

The child from 9 to 12 interests me very much. And so, those were the years that I like to write about, when I'm writing.

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

When I was growing up, I dreamed about becoming a cowgirl, a detective, a spy, a great actress, or a ballerina. Not a dentist, like my father, or a homemaker, like my mother - and certainly not a writer, although I always loved to read.