Something About The Joy And

I Have Made A Career Of Creating Characters Who Fight School Authority And Chomp At The Bit To Get Out Into The 'real' World And Live Their Lives, Mostly Because That's The Kind Of Teenager I Was.

...the Magnificent Seven Consisted Of One Swimmer Of Color, A Representative From Each Extreme Of The Educational Spectrum, A Muscle Man, A Giant, A Chameleon, And A One-legged Psychopath. When I Envision Us Walking Seven Abreast Through The Halls Of Cutter High, Decked Out In The Sacred Blue And Gold, My Heart Swells.

I Walk Outside And Scream At The Top Of My Lungs, And It Maybe Travels Two Blocks. A Whale Unleashes His Cry, And It Travels Hundreds Or Even Thousands Of Miles. Every Whale In The Ocean Will At One Time Or Another Run Into That Song. And I Figure Whales Probably Don't Edit. If They Think It, They Say It...whale Talk Is The Truth, And In A Very Short Period Of Time, If You're A Whale, You Know Exactly What It Is To Be You.

You Have To Be Careful Not To Use Anything Too Colloquial Or You Date The Book.

My First Book, 'running Loose', Was Censored Back In 1983 Or '84. Every Book I've Written Since Has Been Censored Somewhere.