When I wrote 'Home Safe,' I wanted to look at a number of things: the mystery and joy and pain of creativity. What happens when a vital safety net is suddenly removed. The difficulty some people have in growing up. The way a deep love can be as crippling as it is satisfying. But mostly, I wanted to look at the mother-daughter relationship.

I think conflict is one of the things that makes for a good story.

Writing is, of course, a solitary occupation. But for many writers, myself included, it's through writing that we make certain vital connections.

I like my house to feel like a place where I can just lie back and say, 'Ahhhhh, I'm home.'

There's something about a new family moving into the White House that's kind of interesting, even if you didn't vote for them.

Individual children are separated from their parents only when those parents cross the border illegally and are arrested. We can't have children with parents who are in incarceration.

Doctor Who' began as family television: a show that kids and their parents and grandparents can all watch, maybe even together, on the sofa.

What my parents believed was that, you know, the best wealth they could give to us children was to educate us and, you know - give us that foundation.