I'm an old hag. I keep to myself most of the time and don't talk to strangers. Don't get me wrong–I like people. I like them so much that they get me wound up, and I can only take them in small doses.

So at the end of the day, after dinner and baby's bedtime, I take an oil lamp from the kitchen table and ascend the steep, narrow staircase to a coal-scented garret room. I plant my bum in the hard hickory chair and hunch feverishly over my unfinished manuscript, scribbling in the margins with a fountain pen.

Okay. So I don't have a garret room or an oil lamp. And I use a cheap scarlet ballpoint pen. But otherwise, that's a pretty accurate description of my night life.

If you'd like to see unfinished bits of the manuscript that consumes my life, visit my book website.

This is not my writing space. But why don't we just keep imagining it is?