Apart from a small minority, teenage boys fall into three distinct categories: macho, metro, or just plain muddled.

My school is very good and quite understanding and know I have to take time off for interviews or writers' festivals.

I was the kind of kid who was always making up stories and adventures.

The South is full of memories and ghosts of the past. For me, it is the most inspiring place to write, from William Faulkner's haunted antebellum home to the banks of the Mississippi to the wind that whispers through the cotton fields.

My earliest memory is making peach cobbler with my grandmother. A wonderful memory. I grew up in a restaurant family - B.B.Q. restaurant.

Balancing family and work is a top priority for me, and I treat it as such. Meaning, I actually put specific family time and events in my calendar so that precious time is dedicated and properly blocked off from any work that may try to sneak its way into my schedule.

In 1963, my parents took over a camp business from my grandparents. They turned it into a liberal, progressive, a co-educational, interracial camp for kids from all over the world, all over the country. And it was a very important cause for both of my parents.

Everyone in my family sang, and we would always sing these songs.