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I hate writing. I almost never write. I write against deadlines. And when I'm teaching, I'm focused on that.

When I was bringing up a child, I taught myself to write in very short, concentrated bursts. If I had a weekend, or a week, I'd do unbelievable amounts of work.

Writing is a creatively rewarding occupation but for me very time consuming.

Like everyone else, there are days when I don't want to go to work. However, writing is a job like anything else.

People say you can't teach writing, but I think that's nonsense.

I taught elementary school and painted apartments for ten years. Now I write full-time and never have to change a thing I write. Every book comes to me in a flash of inspiration and takes me about two seconds to finish. The longer books, like the 'Time Warp Trio' novels, take a little longer to write - more like four seconds.

I couldn't run a tight schedule, and if you're any good at teaching, you get sucked dry because you like your students and you're trying to help them, but you don't have any time left to write yourself.

I have written more than 100 novels and novellas since 1983 - I was first published in 1985. There was an overlap of three years with my teaching career, but finally I felt good enough about my writing career to quit teaching and write full time.

I come to writing the same way I come to teaching, which is that my goal is always to create life-long readers.