I think that most of the children's writers live in the world that they've created, and their children are kind of phantoms that wander around the edge of it in the world, but actually the children's writers are the children.

The more research you do, the more at ease you are in the world you're writing about. It doesn't encumber you, it makes you free.

I always say I write my own novels and the characters don't take control of me, but in fact, I look at the characters in the early stages and I think, 'What is he or she like,' and they slowly come together and they become the person they are.

A. S. Byatt Quotes