I lived in New Mexico until I was seventeen, and honestly I've been homesick ever since I left.

I was at an art museum with my parents, and was quite taken with a [Vincent] Van Gogh painting. I stood admiring the painting for some time, and then realized that in addition to feeling moved by the beauty of the painting, I felt a little jealous of the painter.

When Ivy [Wilkes] begins her work in forgery, she doesn't yet know the toll that it will take on her own original work. She even thinks it might be a way to find inspiration. By the time she realizes that she has lost her own voice, she is thoroughly entangled in the forgery mess.

[Ivy Wilkes] loves [Georgia] O'Keeffe's work, but is not satisfied by just looking at the paintings; she wants the painting to be her own. The plot grew naturally out of Ivy's personality (and flaws).

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.

Publishing requires a lot of persistence and a fair amount of luck.

When I finished the book [The Dissemblers], I sent it to one billion agents, and got one billion rejections.