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I was the typical little sister who wanted to be just like her older brother. When I was growing up, my brother wrote phenomenal stories, so I wanted to write them, too.

My sisters, we didn't like each other as kids. We were scared of each other, I think, but we've grown to love each other. It was fun to write about these sisters who were supposed to hate each other but really don't.

I used to write things for friends. There was this girl I had a crush on, and she had a teacher she didn't like at school. I had a real crush on her, so almost every day I would write her a little short story where she would kill him in a different way.

When Nandita expressed a desire to write about me, I couldn't stop her because she's my wife, but she has forgotten who she is.

'Say Her Name' was a book I never wanted to write and never expected to write. I wasn't trying to do anything except write a book for Aura - a book that I thought I had to write.

Every story was being made up. My true friends weren't the ones speaking. It was people who never knew me, making up stories. Even my local paper put a $1,000 bounty out for information about my whereabouts.

At one point, I had a story accepted at the 'New Yorker,' which sent off weird bells in people when I told them - 'Oh,' they thought, 'now you are a writer' - where I really had been for the last 30-odd years.

There have been so many things written about me that are untrue and horrifying.

When I came out, I told my stepmother Gladys, and she just said she had known for years and was glad I wasn't lying anymore.

I was so worried that people wouldn't like me or my story.