I know that at literary festivals I'm speaking mostly to middle-class women, who frequently vote in a way that is contrary to how I'd like them to vote.

I'll be happy if I can gain even the smallest place inside the literary imagination of U.S. readers.

What I look at with each vote is that priority of whether it's good for the middle class or not.

I can't really remember a time in my life when I didn't know something about what we call the Holocaust. It was this dark topic that I would know more about when I got older, but which was spoken about in hushed tones.

I grew up a middle class, colonized child of teachers and librarians and people, women especially, who treasured education.

I like dialogue in novels. I wanted to avoid laying history on with a trowel - appearing to be lecturing, as opposed to the characters lecturing their children or students. Dialogue can humanise the story and make it go down somewhat more smoothly.