I have survivor skills. Some of that is superficial - what I present to people outwardly - but what makes people resilient is the ability to find humour and irony in situations that would otherwise overpower you.
It's both rebellion and conformity that attack you with success.
Whenever I'm with my [teenager], I feel as though I have to spend the whole time avoiding land mines.
For books I want to keep reading, it's definitely the voice. It must be a voice I've never heard before, and it must have its own particular intelligence. By 'voice,' I don't mean vernacular. It has to have its own particular history and world that it inhabits.
I don't steer clear of genres. I simply haven't steered myself toward some of them.
There are a lot of people who think that's what's needed to be successful is always being right, always being careful, always picking the right path.
