Following my muse has worked out pretty well so far. I can't see any reason to change the formula now.

What has happened is, not only has CEIFA not really worked as far as the formula goes, but it hasn't been funded to the levels that were promised in it. Consequently, the state aid has remained pretty much flat for the last three or four years.

It did occur to me that certainly African-Americans are not underserved in picture books, but those books are almost all about specifically black experiences.

I sculpted for four or five years. Mostly for my own amusement, I decided to do a picture book, and that was kind of a turning point.

I write for what's left of the eight-year-old still rattling around inside my head.

The Polar Express is about faith, and the power of imagination to sustain faith. It's also about the desire to reside in a world where magic can happen, the kind of world we all believed in as children, but one that disappears as we grow older.