I wrote books to entertain. I'm not trying to teach anything! If I suspected the author was trying to show me how to be a better behaved girl, I shut the book.

My mother always kept library books in the house, and one rainy Sunday afternoon - this was before television, and we didn't even have a radio - I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered I was reading and enjoying what I read.

With twins, reading aloud to them was the only chance I could get to sit down. I read them picture books until they were reading on their own.

I was a very observant child. The boys in my books are based on boys in my neighborhood growing up.

I write in longhand on yellow legal pads.