I spend about a year between novels.

Ever consider what pets must think of us? I mean, here we come back from a grocery store with the most amazing haul – chicken, pork, half a cow. They must think we’re the greatest...

My writing day has grown shorter as I’ve aged, although it seems to produce the same number of pages.

It wasn’t what you said”, he told her.”It was how I felt when you said it”.

But what I hope for from a book – either one that I write or one that I read – is transparency. I want the story to shine through. I don’t want to think of...

People imagine that missing a loved one works kind of like missing cigarettes. The first day is really hard but the next day is less hard and so forth, easier and easier the longer you...

I think it must be very hard to be one of the new young writers who are urged to put themselves forward when it may be the last thing on earth they’d be good at.

None of my own experiences ever finds its way into my work. However, the stages of my life — motherhood, middle age, etc. — often influence my subject matter.

Not until the final draft do I force myself to remember that I’m going to have to think about how it will affect other people.

You know why I like to talk to you, Delia? You never interrupt with your experiences. Not jiggling your foot till you get a chance to jump in with your life history.

For me, writing something down was the only road out.

I’m falling into disrepair

I was standing in the schoolyard waiting for a child when another mother came up to me. Have you found work yet? she asked. Or are you still just writing?

She thinks the people she loves are better than they really are, and so then she starts changing things around to suit her view of them

She worded it a bit strongly, but I do find myself more and more struck by the differences between the sexes. To put it another way: All marriages are mixed marriages.

Past is past… no it’s not! People are always fond of saying that, but what’s past is never past; not entirely.

I can never tell ahead of time which book will give me trouble – some balk every step of the way, others seem to write themselves – but certainly the mechanics of writing, finding the...