And so The Snow Queen also became a story about the need to seek equilibrium, in our own lives, with the natural world, even within the universe at large.

Humans may be the only creatures on Earth who spend significant time thinking about the fact that someday their lives will end.

Throughout the ages, stories with certain basic themes have recurred over and over, in widely disparate cultures; emerging like the goddess Venus from the sea of our unconscious.

The futures and ultimate fates of the characters in The Snow Queen are profoundly changed by choices made in their own minds or hearts, as well as choices unexpectedly forced on them by things beyond their control.

Studying anthropology, I developed a kind of holistic view of human existence, in which the dichotomies you listed are all necessary and vital aspects of life.

Beyond that, I seem to be compelled to write science fiction, rather than fantasy or mysteries or some other genre more likely to climb onto bestseller lists even though I enjoy reading a wide variety of literature, both fiction and nonfiction.

Besides, wouldn't it be wonderful if no one ever had to worry about the random cruelty of fatal illness or the woes of old age attacking them or their loved ones?

These days too many of us seem inclined to cover our ears, close our eyes, and blindly follow the most narrow, conservative tenets of religion; or else seek comfort in the ancient traditions of New Age ritual.

The ecosystem of our world is a closed system: it would run out of gas, collapse of its own weight.

I was thinking about what I wanted to write next, after my first novel, and had decided that I wanted to write a story with a lot of strong female characters in it.

Here was a fragment of Goddess myth that, through all its permutations, had somehow escaped being turned on its head. It was the perfect springboard for the sort of novel I wanted to write.

Everything born has to die, in order to make room for the future.

Perhaps the thing that makes humans truly unique on Earth is that we are never satisfied with our situation; maybe that is what's taken us so far.

And so The Snow Queen also became a story about the need to seek equilibrium, in our own lives, with the natural world, even within the universe at large.

What does immortality mean to me? That we all want more time; and we want it to be quality time.

For every path you choose, there is another you must abandon, usually forever.

Myth is, after all, the neverending story.

As for the historical inspirations I drew on in writing The Snow Queen, I suppose I would call them more cross-cultural inspirations, though they frequently involve past societies as well as present day ones.

There's no such thing as a free lunch, at least on the karmic level.

We are all born with a unique genetic blueprint, which lays out the basic characteristics of our personality as well as our physical health and appearance... And yet, we all know that life experiences do change us.

Moon is also a naive native girl when she sets out for Carbuncle.

Probably I chose immortality because mortality is a universal human obsession.

Each time, storytellers clothed the naked body of the myth in their own traditions, so that listeners could relate more easily to its deeper meaning.

Humans are upsetting a fragile balance that their own human ancestors established.

The contradictions are what make human behavior so maddening and yet so fascinating, all at the same time.

Fear of the unknown is a terrible fear.

What I do not want to write is didactic political tracts.

The mers were also designed to reproduce only at long intervals, in order to maintain the natural balance of the environment in which they were placed.

I wanted to show those characters discovering it is possible to find common ground, as they make their way through a plotline that I hope is engrossing enough to keep the reader a willing participant.

But our society does not grant nontraditional forms of intelligence equal recognition, no matter how much it would help us get along or truly enrich our lives.

The contradictions are what make human behavior so maddening and yet so fascinating all at the same time.

Indifference is the strongest force in the universe. It makes everything it touches meaningless. Love and hate don't stand a chance against it.

The Queen is the only person who can put on a tiara with one hand, while walking down stairs.

I'd like to be Queen Elizabeth.

I was growing up listening to Queen. Freddie Mercury threw those incredible melodies into his songs.

There's only one Elizabeth like me and that's the Queen.

I wasn't a cheerleader or the prom queen. I don't move through the world with a mirror in front of my face, and I've never been attracted to projects that had an emphasis on what I look like.

I was always a drama queen. I remember playing in the kitchen, trying to get my mom to think I was dead and call the police. When she didn't, I would cry. I was always theatrical. I don't think any of my relatives are surprised.

I love photo sessions. I'm alone, I'm the queen, everyone's taking care of me.

Once upon a time there was a Queen who had a son so ugly and so misshapen that it was long disputed whether he had human form. A fairy who was at his birth said, however, that he would be very amiable for all that, since he would have uncommon good sense.

Queen has taken the all of our time for last four or five years, you know.

The futures and ultimate fates of the characters in The Snow Queen are profoundly changed by choices made in their own minds or hearts, as well as choices unexpectedly forced on them by things beyond their control.

For a time I didn't want to answer any questions about Queen. I'd like to be viewed as something alive and relevant, not some fossil.

I didn't get along with Lindsay Lohan on 'Confessions Of A Teenage Drama Queen', but you have to consider that we were 16-year-old girls. I haven't seen Lindsay since then, but I imagine she's grown and become a different person. I know I have.

A beautiful woman can be painted as a totem only; not as a woman, but as a Madonna, a queen, a sphinx.

Rhyme, that enslaved queen, that supreme charm of our poetry, that creator of our meter.

I'll take being on Baywatch over being Prom Queen any day.

There's four biggies. There was Elizabeth I, George III, Victoria, and the current queen, who really dominated four eras.

I wasn't the high-school play queen or anything. And my parents would let not me act until I graduated from college.