So much work went into this book [ "The Thorn & The Blossom"] - you can probably tell from looking at the art and overall design.

I had a short story collection come out in 2006, and then I couldn't work on large projects for a long time because I was finishing my doctoral degree.

What writers do - everything comes from inside, from experiences of the world that we have digested. And then we turn it into silk, or stories.

Believe in the importance of your art.

If readers like The Thorn and the Blossom, which I would call literary fantasy, I think they would like books such as Elizabeth Hand's Mortal Love, Catherynne Valente's The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making, and Kelly Link's Stranger Things Happen.

I loved writing something I'd never written before, and I wanted to write not just about "true love" but also a human relationship.

The format of the book was the idea of my wonderful editor, Stephen Segal. Stephen and I had worked together before, on projects for the Interstitial Arts Foundation, and when he got the idea for an accordion-style book, he called and asked if I could write the story for it. I told him that I would love to try! And I knew it had to be a love story, because that's the sort of story you really want to hear from both perspectives. I mean, imagine if Pride and Prejudice were told from Darcy's perspective as well as Elizabeth's. It would be quite a different story!