The girls show more skin these days, but I think, generally, they behave the same way as when I was growing up.

I decided that, if I were to write a teen series, I'd want to set it in a place that was familiar to me - Manhattan, where I'd grown up - and I'd model the characters on myself and my friends.

I'm just a crazy person. I mean, I really didn't have any trouble coming up with weird ways for people to die. I think I'm just very twisted!

Back in my days as a children's book editor, my superiors caught on to the fact that teenagers were using the Internet to gossip about each other, and thought it might be nifty to develop a series of books about an anonymous high-school blogger who gossips about her classmates. The concept was passed on to me.

I took myself out of the business to study film at NYU and the School of Visual Arts. I grew up on movie sets and was fascinated with the camera and behind-the-scenes work. I felt it would help my career as an actor if I knew all aspects of film.

As an actor and as a performer, I've felt that the education system has really helped me in a lot of ways... there was always a teacher or a professor along the way that kept pushing me to the next stage.

It's not how much you spend, it's how you spend it. We have been putting a lot of money into education in the state of Nevada, and it's gotten us to 50th in the country in graduation rates. We needed more accountability in our system.

KIPP schools would be just a shining example of schools where students aren't just given homework and taught imaginative ways, but they're really brought into a culture of education.