I have one vivid memory of one of the days that the marches were taking place. We were in a Catholic, predominantly Polish and Lithuanian neighborhood. Chicago is a place where people define themselves by their parish and by their ethnicity.

I always wrote; my first story was published in the magazine The American Girl when I was 11

I'm very honoured that there is a loyal following and I hope it continues

The decimation of Lebanon was showing up in Chicago as a series of restaurants and little shops, just as the destruction of Vietnam had been visible here a decade earlier. If you never read the news but ate out a lot you should be able to tell who was getting beaten up around the world.

It's hard for me to believe that just my words on the page are enough. I ought to be out physically keeping abortion safe and legal, restoring the Fourth Amendment, getting clean water back into Kentucky since the Bush Administration has allowed strip miners to fill it all up with slag. The list is endless. Bring it down. Make it small. Make it one thing that you can do. It's very hard for me to remember that.

I realised I'd never climb Everest but thought I could still write a book

My parents were liberal intellectuals but even they expected me to stay at home and look after my younger siblings and do the housework.