I have struggled all my life with my stuttering. Not to mention all my other speech impediments. I think I have every language disorder known to speech pathologists.

It has always seemed a cruel joke to me that the very word 'stutter' is difficult for many stutterers to pronounce. It is onomatopoeic, an imitation of the halting, repetitive sound made by people with this speech dysfunction.

You cannot write a book unless it is totally inhabiting your imagination and you are totally engrossed with it. Which is a kind word for obsession.

I love fairy tales because of their haunting beauty and magical strangeness. They are set in worlds where anything can happen. Frogs can be kings, a thicket of brambles can hide a castle where a royal court has lain asleep for a hundred years, a boy can outwit a giant, and a girl can break a curse with nothing but her courage and steadfastness.

Fairy tales are stories of triumph and transformation and true love, all things I fervently believe in.