My concern is how we learn to be genuine human beings.

I came to fantasy fairly late. For some ten years, I had been happily writing fiction and non-fiction for adults. But I always loved fantasy, whether for adults or young people; and at that particular point in my life, I wanted to try it, to understand it, as part of the process of learning to be a writer. The results were beyond anything I could have foreseen. As I've said often and elsewhere, it was the most creative and liberating experience of my life.

The point is not to look back, but to look ahead to what you hope still to do.

Shakespeare, Dickens, Mark Twain, and so many others were my dearest friends and greatest teachers.

Keep out of this," Lucian said. "I'm not smiting anybody." "You're showing mercy." Catch-a-Tick nodded. "That's heroic, too. But not as good as smiting.

Hope is an essential thread in the fabric of all fantasies, an Ariadne's thread to guide us out of the labyrinth ... Human beings have always needed hope, and surely now more than ever.

My parents were horrified when I told them I wanted to be an author.