Every couple has ups and downs, every couple argues, and that’s the thing—you’re a couple, and couples can’t function without trust.

That's why I loved being with you. We could do the simplest things, like toss starfish into the ocean and share a burger and talk and even then I knew that I was fortunate. Because you were the first guy who wasn't constantly trying to impress me. You accepted who you were, but more than that, you accepted me for me. And nothing else mattered-- not my family or your family or anyone else in the world. It was just us.

Beauty might prevail in the very short term, but in the medium and longer terms, cultural norms - primarily those values and norms influenced by family - were more important.

I write the things that I find most attractive in women. I like intelligence, I like passion - give me a little fire, be strong, don't be wishy-washy, do the right thing.

I suppose I'm most influenced by any good, commercial writer. I learn from everyone.

I tend to avoid melodrama. I try to create very realistic settings and very realistic experiences and realistic responses to these experiences. Melodrama is the use of really big events that may or may not happen in real life - certainly they do, but they're not events that are common to most people. Most of the things that happen in my novels are things that could happen to people in real life.

It's your eyes. They're ... more serious than they used to be. Like they've seen things they shouldn't have.