Yet [Georgia O'Keeffe ] always stayed true to her vision, and was at times uncompromising in following the path she saw for herself.

Does art play a role in the greater good of society, or does it just promote the satisfaction of the artist? I go back and forth on that question.

I find that time constraints actually make me more productive, and "real world" experiences provide a lot of inspiration to write.

I read letters and journal entries by [Georgia] O'Keeffe (which were infinitely more useful than any critical analysis of her work).

Finally, I found a wonderful agent who wanted to work with me, and she sent it to one billion publishers and received one billion rejections, until I was fortunate enough to be matched up with the Permanent Press.

I am currently in nursing school, so one day I will be both a nurse and a writer.

At the beginning of the book [The Dissemblers], Ivy [Wilkes] has a long way to go in order to achieve self-sufficiency. Although she is very independent, even somewhat of a loner, she is very affected by other peoples' opinions. At the opening of the book, her ideas of success and achievement are largely defined by the approval of others; over the arc of the story, I think that begins to change a little.