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We have to acknowledge that adolescence is that time of transition where we begin to introduce to children that life isn't pretty, that there are difficult things, there are hard situations, it's not fair. Bad things happen to good people.

Adolescence is the most Technicolor time in our lives. It's the time when adulthood is new and we care most about it. It contains the highs and lows that excite me as a writer.

There's slowly been a kind of shift in how we think about childhood. It's like childhood almost extends to 20 or 22 even after the end of college. When I was growing up, there was this expectation that you were on your own now.

The thing about adolescence is that you are emerging from a state of obscurity. You are coming out into the world from your family. Your family can seem normal because it is your family and all you know, but in fact it is a mess.

Having children truly ends adolescence. We are all either parents or children: responsibility-takers or those who demand from others.

Adolescence is the conjugator of childhood and adulthood.

Parents are in denial a lot of the time - everybody knows what they did as a teenager, but somehow, when they grow up, it all disappears.

Young children seem to be learning who to share this toy with and figure out how it works, while adolescents seem to be exploring some very deep and profound questions: 'How should this society work? How should relationships among people work?' The exploration is: 'Who am I, what am I doing?'

I think there's a lot of pressure on young people to really be the thing that everyone is telling them that they are, opposed to discovering it for themselves.

I think some parents fall into a trap, teaching their kids that everything is always perfect and everyone is always a winner.