I think Peter Dickinson is hands down the best stylist as a writer and the most interesting storyteller in my genre.

She knew the intensity of adolescence, and knew no cure for it except growing up. And then one has age and experience, and mourns the loss of intensity. Maybe it's why musicians and mathmaticians are said to peak young-poetry needs the fire of an unbounded universe.

Nothing kinder than strangers. Nothing stranger than kindness.

Sometimes I panic and think I can't really write.

I love to sing. I'm a soprano.

I believe that to create real-seeming characters, the writer must be willing to go on a voyage of self-exploration. It can be revealing and even painful to explore your own weakness, but it gives you genuine emotion. Characters in fiction come alive because of the believability of their emotional lives and that is what I strive to create.

I wish I could remember where I put things. I spend half my life looking for my keys. With the other half I look for my glasses.