[Rejection] made me quit writing once. For six months. I started up again when my then seven-year-old son asked me to start writing again because I was too grumpy when I wasn't writing.

I will have to rely on that painful teacher, experience.

Why couldn't I be more like other girls my age? Take Mrs. Brown's niece. She spent every waking hour sizing up this beau or that, stitching tea towels and petticoats and putting aside a little each month for a set of Spode Buttercup dishes.

The wren and the nightingale sound nothing alike, but think how dull the world would be without the songs of both birds.-Miss Kanagawa

[Rejection] made me quit writing once. For six months. I started up again when my then seven-year-old son asked me to start writing again because I was too grumpy when I wasn't writing.

I am the richest person alive (or at least one of!) because I get to do what I love as a career.

Well, before writing became all-consuming, I was a quilter, like Hattie and Perilee. I don’t do that anymore, but I do knit, garden and watch the birds in my backyard. I also take lots of walks, do yoga and talk my husband into taking me out to dinner as often as possible.