I like to tell young people - you know one in four children die by their own hands - no matter how bad things seem, just wait a day, wait a week. Life will turn around.

So this is always the key: you have to write the book you love, the book that's alive in your heart. That's the one you have to write.

Pain and suffering are the soil of strength and courage.

You don't know me, but I know about you...I can't make you live longer. I can't stop you from hurting. But I can give you one wish, as someone did for me.

What really grabs me is when a reader writes to express her personal story and how a book helped her situation, or her acceptance of a situation she can't change. I read some sad cases in my snail and electronic mail. I respond to all I can, affirming that they are the true heroes of life because they are fighting through adversity and surviving.

I wanted to write about the third world and had the opportunity to go live in the trenches, so to speak.

We all didn't come into to the world at the same time so it makes sense that we don't leave it at the same time.