The most ethical way to deal with an unethical situation would be to simply say: 'We did something wrong.' But nobody in a family like mine would ever respond like this.

I knew people were independently publishing, and I buy books on Amazon. I began seriously considering it when Amanda Hocking was in the news about her self-publishing success.

Life Lesson 3: You can't rush grief. It has its own timetable. All you can do is make sure there are lots of soft places around - beds, pillows, arms, laps.

I would not call myself a veteran conspiracy theorist. Or an obsessed one. I pretty much peaked on the whole conspiracy theory thing in the '60s, with the grassy knoll, who really killed JFK, and who ordered the hit on Lee Harvey Oswald.

I don't think it's an accident who our parents are; I believe we choose them. So maybe I chose my parents in order to effect change.

The house I grew up in had large plate-glass windows, which birds frequently crashed into headfirst. My father helped me assemble a bird hospital, consisting of a few shoe boxes, some old rags, and tiny dishes for water and food.

America had taken my father from me. And over most of the years of his illness, I gradually started feeling this support system from this country who-people grieving along with us.