Death is very mysterious to us. One moment someone is there with us, and the next moment they're not.
Katherine PatersonKids often ask me if characters are real or made up - and I always tell them, 'I hope they're real but I made them up.'
Katherine PatersonAll of us can think of a book... that we hope none of our children or any other children have taken off the shelf. But if I have the right to remove that book from the shelf - that work I abhor - then you also have exactly the same right and so does everyone else. And then we have no books left on the shelf for any of us.
Katherine PatersonCrazy people who are judged to be harmless are allowed an enormous amount of freedom ordinary people are denied.
Katherine PatersonThe gift of creative reading, like all natural gifts, must be nourished or it will atrophy. And you nourish it, in much the same way you nourish the gift of writing - you read, think, talk, look, listen, hate, fear, love, weep - and bring all of your life like a sieve to what you read. That which is not worthy of your gift will quickly pass through, but the gold remains.
Katherine Paterson