When I got my very first phone call that I'd hit the 'New York Times' list, I had a small rush of 'I've made it!' But the next morning, it occurred to me I didn't know what it was, so I called my agent and asked what being a 'New York Times' bestselling author really meant. He informed me that I was now a thousand pound gorilla.

Mental illness is a disease and organic mental illness of young kids is becoming more and more of a disease... we do need to talk about it.

I still read romance, and I read suspense. I read them both. And part of it is, I like stories with strong characters, and I like stories where there's closure at the end. And I like stories where there's hope. That's a kind of empowerment. I think romance novels are very empowering, and I think suspense novels are, too.

It is difficult to get men to pick up a female author. Women will read men, but men won't read women.

I don't know much about international policing and I would love to learn more. Especially in this day and age when the Internet is rapidly reducing borders and crime can happen on a larger scale than ever before. These things intrigue me.

It wasn’t that strangers couldn’t hurt you. It was simply that the people you loved could do it so much better.

Post-apocalyptic novels tell you that in the future there is some great war. I would tell you that most cops say that it's going on right now.