May God strike me down with a hammer on the head before I write a book with a teach-y goal!

Most of my books begin with an image or a voice - one small thing - and I don't know what it is going to become.

Nobody ever learns anything.

Forgiveness, reader, is, I think, something very much like hope and love - a powerful, wonderful thing. And a ridiculous thing, too.

What I hope is that the book [Bink & Gollie] delights children. What I hope is that they laugh and laugh and laugh, just as we did when we wrote them.

There's nothing more fabulous than an adult saying to you, "I think that you might like this one [book]." So I'm grateful every time that happens. It's an amazing thing that people care that passionately.

the story is not a pretty one. there is violence in it. And cruelty. But stories that are not pretty have a certain value, too, I suppose. Everything, as you well know (having lived in this world long enough to have figured out a thing or two for yourself), cannont always be sweetness and light.