Hallie Ephron

When something happens far back in the past, people often can't recall exact details. Blame depends upon point of view. There may be a villain, but reality is frustrating because it's often ambiguous.

When you put your characters in a dire situation, they often do things that surprise even you, so you have to go back and revise your original conception of who they are.

As we got older, we grew comfortable in roles that met our parents' expectations. Nora was the smart one. Delia, the comedian. I was the pretty, obedient one. And Amy was the adventurous mischief-maker.

I haven't given any thought to collaborating with my sisters. It would be great fun. My daughter Molly is a wonderful writer - someday I'd love to collaborate with her.

I don't think anybody in my family meant there to be any pressure for me to write. But our parents were incredibly verbal and wrote for a living. The house was full of books, and we all grew up steeped in language. I mean, our mother recited poetry at the dinner table.

Outlining is like putting on training wheels. It gives me the courage to write, but we always go off the outline.

I'd long wanted to write about that moment when a woman steps off the career track to have her first child. For me, that was a scary time.

I'm sharpest early, and though I can rewrite any time, day or night, I'm useless after noon when it comes to writing first draft.

I'm someone who sits at a computer eight hours a day, and I look in that pinhole camera at the top of my screen and think, 'Someone could be watching me.'