I've always set my stories in places I know well. It frees me up to spend more imaginative time on the characters if I'm not worrying about the logistics.
But certainly in my grandmother's time - and when I was growing up, yeah, Demetrie's bathroom was on the side of the house, it was a separate door. Still, to this day, I've never been in that room.
It's always difficult to say goodbye, especially when one has spent a long time - literally years, in the case of a series - inside a character or two, suffering and celebrating with them.
I have a nice little office, with a nice little window in it, but I do basically spend huge amounts of time in what you could consider solitary confinement.
I have a gruff side. This is not exactly news... At the same time, anyone who wants to judge me for this can walk a mile in my moccasins. And then we'll talk.
Maggie Fitzgerald: Will you tell him I'm real sorry? Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris: No. I will do no such thing, Maggie.
I think it's more optimistic about human nature to acknowledge that people are the products of their time but then to see that they have moments of grace and dignity that everybody has.
The children, each of those kids is in touch with nature and traditional aboriginal culture so a very important part of getting performances from them was just letting them be and trying to capture the unique spirituality that was in each of them.
Probably careful plotting reflects my personality. I am meticulous by nature. I can't imagine speed-writing anything that happens to pop into my head.
I know. I'm lazy. But I made myself a New Years resolution that I would write myself something really special. Which means I have 'til December, right?
Let our New Year's resolution be this: we will be there for one another as fellow members of humanity, in the finest sense of the word.
The new year stands before us, like a chapter in a book, waiting to be written. We can help write that story by setting goals.
We may not have demon fathers dangling offers of infernal power before us, but everyone understands what it means to struggle with temptation or resist the urge to give in to our baser natures.
It's not really an original idea, but there's something that goes along with power and celebrity that starts to make you feel like you're impervious to certain forces that the rest of us have to live with.
From a writing point of view, you now have teams of screenwriters working with a director. What's lost in the process is the power of that one heart, brain, gut and soul that makes something an original piece of writing.
People have different relationships with power. I suppose a large portion of the 'Homeland' audience aligns with the U.S., sort of against the enemies. We certainly have the CIA viewpoint on the world - and it's their job.
I have the power to write these books where I invent characters that I really like, and it gets to come out the way they want it to come out, and I get to make it happen.
I don't want to sound too Oprah-ish or anything like that, but I really believe that if you have the power to imagine particular things, you have the ability to transform them.
I've been blessed with the opportunity to express the views of black people who otherwise don't have access to power and the media. I have to take advantage of that while I'm still bankable.
I am a writer, which means I write stories, I write novels, and I would write poetry if I knew how to. I don't want to limit myself.
Romantic poetry had its heyday when people like Lord Byron were kicking it large. But you try and make a living as a poet today, and you'll find it's very different!
