What would make me happiest is if kids read these books [Bink & Gollie] and think: there is so much to love in the world; and words are so much fun..

Reading a story should be a fabulous, wonderful thing. The most important thing that parents can do for kids is to read with them and to let their ki….

Normally, Edward would have found intrusive, clingy behavior of this sort very annoying, but there was something about Sarah Ruth. He wanted to take ….

Mercy Watson is a pig. She lives with Mr. and Mrs. Watson, who are not pigs. I had that basic premise, but I couldn't make it work. I would come back….

I was visiting my mother in Florida when the September 11, 2001 attacks happened. I was working on The Tale of Despereaux at that point. I had alread….

Like most hearts, it was complicated, shaded with dark and dappled with light..

There," she said. She rocked him back and forth. "There, you foolish, beautiful boy who wants to change the world. There, there. And who could keep f….

I like going to schools and telling classes that when I was a child, I failed every "will this kid become a writer" test..

The origin of each story is unique..

This is a wonderful joke to play upon a prisoner, to promise forgiveness..

I have a Bachelor of Arts in English, which means I had a lot of formal training in reading..

I didn't know at the time I was writing Because of Winn-Dixie where the story came from, but in retrospect I can see that it was a response to a terr….

The image I had was very clear, and so in that way The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane began like other books..

Things are not at all what they seem to be: oh no, not at all..

What's my weirdest adventure? Yikes, there've been so very many. Perhaps the pig+vegetable+Taiwanese-army-guys boat ride to the island off the coast ….

The words, "I have a dog named Winn-Dixie," popped into my head in the voice of a small girl with a southern accent. I'd been writing long enough at ….

I have been loved said Edward to the stars.

I thought I was going nowhere. Now I can see there was a pattern..

The only control you have over a movie is whether or not you decide to sell the rights..

She was working to remind herself of who she was. She was working to remember that somewhere in another place entirely she was known and loved..

I think that that's part of how people have responded to The Tiger Rising. It's what I call my dark child. It's gotten sandwiched in between two over….