I hope I'll keep people up at night, unable to stop turning pages. That's my goal: exhausted, emotionally drained readers who can't stop crying.

My only relief is to sleep. When I'm sleeping, I'm not sad, I'm not angry, I'm not lonely, I'm nothing.

Sometimes you have to say, 'Today's just not my day.

To be honest, I want readers to be wrung out. As a novelist, I don't have a political agenda or specific philosophy; I'm trying to create a gut-wrenching, intimate, memorable experience.

My entire life has been centered around my writing, and by that I mean finding the time to write.

Part of what compels me to write day after day, chapter after chapter, is the discovery process, seeing the characters evolve as I get deeper and deeper into the story.

What I like to do and what I have to do are two separate things. I like to read, swim, watch TV, spend time with my family. But I have to work, so I do that.

To be perfectly frank: I don't write women's fiction. I write intimate, gritty, realistic, character-driven fiction that happens to be thrown into the women's fiction category.

I think there's an unnatural amount of social pressure on women, particularly mothers, to conform to certain standards of behavior, particularly in regard to our children.

I've always been a writer who tackles complex themes and risky subjects - I write about the things that people think but never say aloud.

I love it, I hate it, it's ecstasy when I'm writing well, it's despair when I'm not. I wouldn't wish this life on anyone, nor would I, could I, ever give it up.

Accept things inf life and then start fighting. It is like knowing the armory skills of your opponent before beginning the battle.

I think I can straighten out our mess in education.

You see things less clearly when you open your eyes too wide.

A secret is a kind of promise.... It can also be a prison.

Women are more balanced than men. Where the most brilliant minds have so far have mostly belonged to men, no women has ever been as stupid as a man can be.

No matter the situation, I stay focused and motivated on my goals because that's the way I was raised.

Two heads are better than one only if they contain different opinions.

Focus more on your desire than on your doubt, and the dream will take care of itself.

I think filmmakers are always interested in getting the best actor that they can find, the person who's the most right for it.

I went with my husband and an innocent child to California. I went to a theatrical manager and asked him to allow me to earn money enough on the stage to buy our tickets home. He did.