Look, don't just stare at the pages," I used to tell my students. "Become the characters. Live inside the book.

First I laughed my way through Elinor Lipman's book of political tweets. Then I put my ear to the ground and listened to Molly Ivins guffawing from the grave. Lipman is a piquant poetic rock star!

So many bad things have happened to them that they can't trust the good things. They have to shove them away before someone can get it back.

Look, don't just stare at the pages," I used to tell my students. "Become the characters. Live inside the book.

I won't read novels while writing novels.

If the book is true, it will find an audience that is meant to read it.

Human behavior in the midst of hardship caught my attention very early on, and my first stories were all pictures, no words.