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" Life is absolutely horrific, leading up to absolute horror. "

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" The thing about adolescence is that you are emerging from a state of obscurity. You are coming out into the world from your family. Your family can seem normal because it is your family and all you know, but in fact it is a mess. "

" When I was at university, there was such a strong delineation between city kids and those who had grown up the suburbs. City kids were so at home in the world, in a way that suburban kids take years to catch up, if indeed they ever can. "

" Contrary to popular belief, editors and agents are gagging for good books. "

" I think the bravest thing to write about is nothing, just to write a book in which nothing happens. "

" It's hard recommending books for kids, and a huge responsibility. If you get it wrong, they don't tell you they hate that particular book, they tell you they hate reading. "

" My daughter is a fantastic travelling companion - she's totally organised, whereas I'm hopeless. "

" One of the more interesting things I've learnt since becoming a writer is that if you like the book, you'll generally like the person. It doesn't always work in reverse - there are huge numbers of lovely people out there writing not very good books. "

" I've spent most of my life trying to wear a persona that didn't quite fit and when I started writing books, it was like finally becoming the right person. "

" The truth about love is that you don't always fall in love with whom you are supposed to fall in love with. Love just hits you. It is a transcendent thing. Sometimes it is your best friend's husband and sometimes it's your father. It's weird. But that's a fact of life. "

" My husband is my most valuable resource. "

" I, a late riser, fantasise about getting up every morning at 5 A.M. to fetch the horses in from the fields. "

" Life doesn't go on forever, and you don't want to drop dead without ever having done what you wanted to do. "

" I'm constantly snatching my books out of the hands of precocious ten-year-olds who are simply too young to read them, despite parents insisting that dear Octavia has a reading age of 28. I remember trying to read 'In Cold Blood' at the age of twelve, and realising that just because you can read book doesn't mean you should. "

" Writing's a great skill, but thinking's a better one. "

" My younger sister Debby had died of cancer, which started me writing - the sense of life being short. Cancer focuses your mind. "

" I lived in New York for 10 years, and every New Yorker sees a shrink. "

" I think most people struggle over a matter of years to find a satisfying way to live. "

" The more you live, the better writer you are. "

" I'm not sure I can write about America for the same reason I'm not sure I can write about adults - I have no critical distance on either place. "

" Your writing voice is the deepest possible reflection of who you are. The job of your voice is not to seduce or flatter or make well-shaped sentences. In your voice, your readers should be able to hear the contents of your mind, your heart, your soul. "

" Nowadays, I only review books I really like. It's cowardly, I know, but I figure it's not my job to make people unhappy. I'll leave that to the professionals. "

" While working in advertising, I channelled my creative energy into elaborate escape fantasies: cake making, dog breeding, the Peace Corps. "

" I can actually trace the moment I decided I couldn't be a doctor. It was in biology, they brought in these African crickets and we were supposed to dissect them - but there's no way I was touching those bugs. "

" In the odd moment when I am not thinking about horses, I write books. "

" I have never written out of a desire to be controversial. "

" There's an overwhelming sense of paranoia in the suburbs. People there seem so much more paranoid to me than people in the city about their kids being kidnapped or their parties being raided or their drinks being spiked. There's a kind of hysteria about that. "

" When you read a book, the neurons in your brain fire overtime, deciding what the characters are wearing, how they're standing, and what it feels like the first time they kiss. No one shows you. The words make suggestions. Your brain paints the pictures. "

" I know from experience that careers do not always arise from a deep sense of destiny. "

" As a person with the retentive mental capacity of a goldfish and a dislike of repetition, I frequently make use of the thesaurus built into my Microsoft Word U.K. Software. "

" I loved horses and horse books as a child. "