Happiness is a talent like any other. It's another art form. Some people are good at it, some people aren't.

We've always lived in dark times. There has always been a range of human experience from the sublime to the brutal, and stories reflect it. It's no less brutal now; each age has its horrors.

Why are so many of us enspelled by myths and folk stories in this modern age? Why do we continue to tell the same old tales, over and over again? I think it's because these stories are not just fantasy. They're about real life. We've all encountered wicked wolves, found fairy godmothers, and faced trial by fire. We've all set off into unknown woods at one point in life or another. We've all had to learn to tell friend from foe and to be kind to crones by the side of the road. . . .

We’re all misfits herefrom our weirdnesses and our differences, from our manic fixations, our obsessions, our passions. From all those wild and wacky things that make each of us unique.

I'd had no particular interest in the Southwest at all as a young girl, and I was completely surprised that the desert stole my heart to the extent it did.

The simple truth is that being a creative artist takes courage; it’s not a job for the faint of heart. It takes courage each and every time you put a book or poem or painting before the public, because it is, in fact, enormously revealing.

I have a great respect for the academics who are working with the source material. My hat's off to them.