I cannot outline. I do not know what the next thing is going to happen in the book until it comes out of my fingers.

I have no special talent, you know. I never took a writing course before I began to write.

If you have a friend, things are better than if you didn't have a friend.

Sometimes when I visit schools, kids will interview me for the school newspaper. They ask me questions and my answers tend to go on and on, and they try to write down everything I'm saying as quickly as they can. And one day, a kid holds up her hand and said, 'Do you think you could just answer 'yes' or 'no?' Aren't kids wonderful?

Everything in my life affects my writing. There are no separate parts of my life.

To me, family is everything. I want children to realize how important their families are and what a support system a family is.

The reasons kids get into trouble in one way or another is because - Who ever told them they were special?