Bricks are crumbling in places, and the front door is so swollen you have to push hard to get in

I can't do a linear novel. I'm just going to write what I need to write.

For example, there's no word emocionó in English, so I have to say, "You, you really emotioned me," It's more precise, even though it sounds odd. "My father emotioned me." Or "That performance really emotioned to me."

I know the books that I need to help me to be wiser than my years and be kinder and more compassionate and more patient than I really am.

You know how sometimes you're talking to people who love you and give you unconditional love, and you say, "But you know what? Let me back up. I forgot to say . . ."You can do that, right? You don't hesitate and say, "Oh my God! I forgot to say that!". You just speak! And you say it all, until you have nothing more to say. And that's your first draft. It's done.

Mom used to walk with me for something like two or three miles to get to the day-old bakery. They had those machines where you buy doughnuts, those vending machines with the long johns and doughnuts. We would buy those bagels and pastries because that was our treat. And come back with shopping bags of these sweets, and who knows what was in it? That was what we could afford that could feed that many people.

My book would come out in one language, then it would come out in another language, then it would come out in One City, One Read, and I was always being called away from my desk.