I feel like there are stages in many, many people's childhoods when you don't have one good friend. It can happen a lot in sixth and seventh grade because that's when things are changing so quickly. It's like a desperate dash for some kind of acceptable identity, and it can get ugly.

Many of the books on my list are, in my opinion, amazing. Some I didn't like. But I give them all five stars, because stars make people - including me -- happy.

Life is really just a bunch of nows, one after the other.

I don't know whether I could visit a new neighborhood now and have a kid's set of observations about a place. I no longer can really think like a child, though I can remember thinking like one.

Trying to forget really doesn't work. In fact, it's pretty much the same as remembering. But I tried to forget anyway, and to ignore the fact that I was remembering you all the time.

The writing process is not just putting down one page after another-it's a lot of writing and then rewriting, restructuring the story, changing the way things come together.

Einstein says common sense is just habit of thought. It's how we're used to thinking about things, but a lot of the time it just gets in the way.