All of my characters are a little bit based on people I know in real life. You know when you do that you have to change the character a little bit in case your friend or your relative reads the book, because you don't want them to know you wrote about them... They might get mad.

My family, theyre story tellers. My mom is Irish, and my dad is Italian. In my family, we werent allowed to watch TV while we ate - we had to sit around the table and tell stories about our day.

What's the point? was my attitude. We're all just going to die and then NOT be let on the boat.

Hormones are very powerful things. We are helpless in their wake.

You just said you were sorry." ... "I was only apologizing," he said stiffly, "for startling you. The applause was to compliment you on the improvement in your life-saving techniques since the last time you-

Because my heat was too full of appreciation for what my friends-- my real friends-- had done for me.

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