My mother wrote a teen column for the South China Morning Post in the 1950s when she was growing up in Hong Kong. Her name was Lily Mark, but she sometimes wrote under her confirmation name, Margaret Mark. That was how she met my father.

My parents did give me a lot of books - biographies of Marie Curie - and I did read them, because I was interested.

Reading feeds writing: it presents you with new ideas to engage with.

I am not a contest-enterer by nature. But contests - and their entry fees - are often the main way literary journals raise money to, you know, publish their issues. So entering contests helps support the journal, which also helps support the writers they publish.

Every writer needs new material now and then, whether it's traveling to Japan, volunteering at a food bank, learning a new language, or trying a new food.

Every single day, authors read at bookstores and libraries - and coffeeshops and bars - all over the country. And these readings are amazing: you get to hear the book in the author's own voice, ask questions, and meet the writer. For free.

What's the best way to ensure a supply of good books in the future? Support up-and-coming writers now.

I'm ashamed to admit that I very seldom read poetry, even though many of my friends are poets.

If someone were to call me 'the next Amy Tan,' it would not be because - or not primarily because - we have similar themes or subjects or styles. Let's be honest: it would be because we are both Chinese American.

Let's stop reflexively comparing Chinese writers to Chinese writers, Indian writers to Indian writers, black writers to black writers. Let's focus on the writing itself: the characters, the language, the narrative style.

Stories work better when not everyone gets what they want.

Narratively speaking, innocent misunderstandings are disappointing. Arbitrary events are also disappointing. The stories that really grab our attention involve not accidents but people doing things on purpose - to get things they desperately want.

I play music on my phone to fall asleep when I'm on the road and as an alarm clock to wake me up, so I need it nearby - but there are never outlets by the bed in hotels!

I keep a writer's notebook and also put all my daily schedules and to-do lists in it.

I lose pens a lot, so I don't use fancy ones.

Whenever I travel, I seem to get sick - it's probably inevitable when you're on a plane every single day.

The first bookstore I loved wasn't a little independent gem nestled in a neighborhood: it was a modest Waldenbooks in our local shopping mall.

My parents used books as bribes: if I got straight A's on my report card, they would buy me one book. This was completely unnecessary, as I always got A's, and they bought me books all the time anyway, and we all knew it.

Now that I have a child of my own, I'm in awe of - and deeply grateful for - the time my parents spent in taking me to bookstores.

I resisted Twitter for a long time. To me, it was synonymous with networking, which in my mind means unceasing self-promotion and superficial small-talk with strangers. A little like wading into a river with a raging current - and I'm a terrible swimmer.

It's so easy, as a writer, to get stuck in your own head, to live in the little worlds you create. To forget that there are people out there reading your work, people who may be deeply affected by what you do, that you are writing not just for yourself, but for them.

In 2011, I didn't read a single book.

As a historically voracious reader - pre-baby, I averaged a book every week or two, and when I was a kid, I'd routinely read a book a day - I never understood how some people could not read. When I heard people say they didn't have time to read, in my head, I simultaneously pitied and ridiculed them: there was always time to read.

Spend enough time wrangling a toddler, and you get good at being kind but firm. Like your child, you must be doggedly single-minded when it matters.

Short of the dishonest, the illegal, and the cruel, there's only one thing my son could do that would really disappoint me: not liking reading.

My husband's parents were both English teachers for decades.

Before my son was even born, he already had two shelves of books.

A love of reading shows empathy, the desire to understand how others live or act or might act - and why.

Even if Pearl S. Buck hadn't spent most of her life in China, she'd have every right to write about it.

Browse Amazon reviews, and you'll see a surprising number of readers who believe one novel can summarize a country, its culture, and its people.

Can fiction teach us? Absolutely. Fiction has the power to illustrate place, era, and atmosphere in vivid detail. But it is not Anthropology for Dummies.

When reading fiction, we cannot automatically assume that what we read is fact.

Short fiction and the novel, nonfiction and fiction, electronic texts and books - these are not opposites. One need not destroy the other to survive.

The competitions between fiction and nonfiction, short and long, electronic and paper, are not battles in which there can be only one victor. After all, we exist in a world where more kinds of writing than ever are greeted with interest and enthusiasm.

You may not be a fan of Twitter-fiction. That's okay. There are novels out there for you - big ones.

The proliferation of styles, genres, and media need not be the death knell of anything. Instead, it's a sign that our acceptance for variation and experimentation has become wider, our interests have become more diverse, and our appetites have become more omnivorous.

Growing up, I loved looking at the photos in my mother's old Betty Crocker cookbook: the chocolate cakes, the cookie house, even the cheese balls and fondues.

My mother is deeply pragmatic by nature. Perhaps you had to be, as an immigrant. You made do.

When my father finished his Ph.D., my mother went back for another bachelor's degree, this time in environmental science.

My mother ended up getting a Ph.D. of her own, in chemistry, and eventually became a tenured professor.

Writing is like shouting into the world. So when someone shouts back, it's a really big deal. To have people who read hundreds and hundreds of books a year say, 'Hey, we thought this was really great,' that's a huge self-esteem boost.

Writers, most of them, don't have a lot of resources.

I did a lot of weird jobs, like most writers do.

There's this sense that whiteness is the default and does not need to be questioned. That you've got a race if you're black, or any kind of Asian, or any kind of Native American, but that you have no race if you are white.

I was freelance proof-reading, freelance editing, creating illustrated slides for doctors' presentations - just so I'd have enough money to take the time to write. That's how I got by.

My husband really treats my writing like it's a job - and he reminds me of that when I have those low moments where I think I should just quit and become a waitress.

Writing, for me, is an extension of thinking - it's my way of processing, and only when I've gotten something down on the page have I thought through it fully.

It's incredibly rewarding to have people come up to me at readings and say, 'I'm not Chinese, but this is the relationship I have with my mother.' Or say, 'Your book made me think a lot about my parents, and I've decided to sign up for counseling.' That is mind-boggling.

With the first novel, I had to tell myself, 'No one is ever going to read it, so you might as well just write it.' With the second, I was pretty sure someone was going to read it.

With the first novel, I was concerned I would be pigeon-holed as an Asian-American writer, and the book would be labeled for Asian-Americans only.