Mama always said a good family has one heartbeat. No one knows you like the people you live with, and no one will take up your cause to the outside world quite like your blood relatives.
Food is so important - it sustains us, it provides a social focal point, and it is fun. I cannot unravel the difference between love in my family and the preparation of food because they are so closely woven.
Maybe a first love exists to reaffirm the best parts of yourself, the choices you made when you didn't worry about the consequences. Maybe a first love exists to remind you to be brave in the moment, to stand up for your feelings, instead of shrinking back in the face of potential loneliness.
You never know when some small thing will lead to a big idea. Travel is very inspirational - but it's in the ordinary that I find my themes of love and work and family.
Looking back, now, I realize that you only ever need one person who lights up that way when you enter a room. One person is all it takes to give a kid confidence.
This should tell you everything you need to know about guys. They only go after what they know they can get. We girls, on the other hand, aim really high. We take a leap.
And so, when I was a young writer I always worked hard on imagery, and I knew that the roots of imagery were the senses - and that if my readers could feel, taste and see what I was talking about, I would be able to tell them a story.
A library is a home filled with our stories. On every shelf, we see ourselves, experience our collective conscious, describe our dreams and our great longing for times that have passed, the sterling moment of the present and the glorious future known only in our imaginations.