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Whether your mother is a novelist like mine or a third-generation military wife, the idea of a son or daughter being in mortal danger is terrifying.

Children are not in a position to assess risk and safety; it must be done for them, and it must be done carefully.

You can't do things unexpected in life if you're not willing to take a risk, and it's easier to risk your own life than it is for your parent to watch you take risks. It's very, very hard for parents to see children doing things that aren't a solid path. I've been through that.

When you have a daughter, you want to protect her from the things that I've seen out there, you know, the things that's out there that ain't good for her. It's a crazy world we live in.

It's a sad moment, really, when parents first become a bit frightened of their children.

Parents become very good at not hearing the explicit words and listening instead to what the child means but doesn't yet know how to say: 'I'm lonely, in pain, frightened' - distress which then unfairly comes out as an attack on the safest, kindest, most reliable thing in the child's world: the parent.

I think parents generally know what's best for their children. But I suppose it's possible to be overprotective.

I'm worried about parents who aren't parenting.