I tend to start with a fantastical premise, and then I place it in the world we know. Or, really, it places itself. Honestly, I feel that I have very little control of the magical aspect, as that's just what comes out for me.

As I get older, I'm finding that I recognize certain celebrities only because they frequently grace the pages of US Weekly, but beyond that, I have no idea what they do.

What I find interesting and heartening, though, is that there does seem to be a shift in the subject matter being written about by women that is doing well in the culture. We're seeing more women writing dystopian fiction, more women writing novels set post-apocalyptic settings, subjects and themes that used to be dominated by men.

As a reader I gravitate toward work that rests in the gray area, that doesn't come with easy answers.

Having a magical element in a realistic setting without explanation seems to me to be the hallmark of fairy tales, which present us with a kind of metaphorical look at some aspect of our lives.

I don't mind being called a "feminist," as I certainly embrace the tenets of feminism, though it does feel a little sad to me that we need to call a novel "feminist" simply because the female characters are interesting and strong.

I'd say that most of life seems to me to be that way, a mixture of the mundane and the mythic, when you're living the life of the mind.