Aimee Bender

“As a kid, I liked making up stories, and I wrote a story about a kangaroo and a bat with Christy Chang, and she went on to become a surgeon.”

“I like birthday cake. It's so symbolic. It's a tempting symbol to load with something more complicated than just 'Happy birthday!' because it's this emblem of childhood and a happy day.”

“Generally, I think most of my writing tends to have some kind of magical element to it. That's the way I can access the emotional life of the character.”

“I love food. I'm not a great cook, but I love to cook, and I like how different it is from writing.”

“Large meadows are lovely for picnics and romping, but they are for the lighter feelings. Meadows do not make me want to write.”

“I get a little myopic in the act of doing any writing. I think I'm not as interested or not as able to write about balance, because I think there's something I want to try to get at. I'm trying to get at something about the experience of growing up or about families.”