When you're writing, at least when I'm writing, I don't think about themes and I try not to sermonize with any particular message.

I had been writing since I was pretty small, and I've always been telling these stories about doors and finding other worlds within our own.

I grew up feeling like a weirdo like many kids do. But I was lucky to find my own home for peculiar children. I went to a school for the gifted in Florida, and it was full of kids who - we were all strange together. And that was a real blessing.

There was romance in the unknown, but once a place had been discovered and cataloged and mapped, it was diminished, just another dusty fact in a book, sapped of mystery. So maybe it was better to leave a few spots on the map blank. To let the world keep a little of its magic, rather than forcing it to divulge every last secret. Maybe it was better, now and then, to wonder.

What I believe when it comes to big things in life, there are no accidents. Everything happens for a reason. You are here for a reason - and it's not to fail and die.

Do you ever find yourself climbing into an open grave during a bombing raid and wish you'd just stayed in bed?

If you must fail ... fail spectacularly!