Profiles

“I believe that as a historical novelist, history is about telling what happened, while historical fiction is about telling how people felt while it happened.”

A raw look at exploring the full range of motherhood, balancing family with career, and creating joy.

“You have to be patient, and take little incremental steps forward knowing that at some point you’re going to have a whole person or a whole book.”

“Maybe looking back 10 years later, you’re kicking yourself. But, you couldn’t have been a different person at the time.”

“The emotional challenge is to head fully toward something that mainly scares me, frightens me, or gives me great joy.”

“I think strength is about so much more than just picking up something heavy. It’s about how you respond to difficult situations—do you give up, or do you persevere because you know there’s probably a way out?”

“I’m a collector of details, and richly described details are like catnip to me, so writers who really invest a lot of detail into their storytelling are the ones I respond to.”

“One of the things I hope people will think about when they’re reading this book is how power is perpetuated. Who gets their story told and heard?”

“Our ‘ideal mother’ concept was created as this selfless domestic goddess to ensure that men could go out into the market sphere and make money while the mothers stayed at home and raised their children to be good little capitalists.”

“I think that helps my daughter because she sees a woman who can have many roles. I believe that because before motherhood I had a full life that made me a better mother.”

“If you expect the miracle and you stick with it, the miracle is much more likely to happen, and it really is a miracle to have a book published in this day and age.”