MARGARET STOHL

The privilege, and the challenges, of taking on Black Widow have never been lost on me. I worked on the first 'Spiderman' game as well as 'Fantastic Four,' and I had always wanted to be able to tell more of a character-driven comic book story than was possible to fit into a game narrative.

I always say, 'I'm cracked. My characters are cracked. And you, reader, you're cracked, too.'

I was very shy - I didn't speak to anyone outside of my family until the fourth grade.

Getting books out into the world helps us all.

Writing is the easy part. The 'getting it right' part is harder.

The Lowcountry traditionally is a logical place where the big ships stopped and brought new things in from the ocean, and the islands have a mystical tradition. It is such a visual place, too, with these iconic villages with the Spanish moss and the village and historical homes and the coast.

Harper Lee was my David Bowie, and I feel her loss in my bones.

We kept my middle schooler home from school for three days before we turned in our final draft because she was so mean and so brutal at editing out all the cheesy bits. She would roll her eyes and make fun of us, and it was what we needed.

I first read Harper Lee's 'To Kill a Mockingbird' as a teen in school, like you did. I read the book alone, eating lunch at my locker, neatly scored oranges my mother divided into five lines with a circle at the top, so my fingers could dig more easily into the orange skin. To this day, the smell of oranges reminds me of 'Mockingbird.'

You better have your story down before you take it to a teenager.

At heart, I would have to say I'm a pantser. I fully embrace the chaos of letting the unintended happen, on life and on the page.

It's like how science fiction in the '50s was a way of talking about war without actually having to risk any political capital. The obvious metaphor is power and powerlessness, but I also think it's a way of experimenting with dangerous feelings in a safe arena and trying things out.

Anyone who says that writing for children or teens is easier than writing for adults has never tried it, because they are so much more critical than adults. You cannot get anything past them.

I was an obsessive fantasy reader from the time I could read at all.

I like to make an outline or cards and then utterly ignore them.

It doesn't matter if it's aliens or emotional weapons or whatever - it's still a real story about big feelings that have to come out.

I'm up at dawn. I practically fall asleep at dinner.

People ask why do I write strong women characters, and basically, all the girls I know are strong; the girls I've had are strong. The women in my life are strong.

We wanted to celebrate the 'Dangerous Deception' release by letting everyone experience the thrill of sharing a book with a reader who wouldn't otherwise have one.

Sam and Dean Winchester sitting on the top of the Impala sharing their feelings over a beer is a reward worth driving any 'Supernatural' demon away - but in real life, they'd have crippling co-dependency issues.

You need books to read and readers for books.

There's a lot of loneliness in a book tour. A lot of grilled cheese sandwiches alone in your hotel at night.

Everything I write is about big feelings. What I care about is trying to be brave enough to feel how you feel and to be emotionally true.

I understand that fictional men aren't real. Not 'really real'. I know this the same way I wonder if my readers are disappointed when they meet me.

I think, to give our bookshelf a little credit, our area of the library and the bookstore has attracted stronger writers as it's started to thrive.