My role models were childless: Virginia Woolf, Jane Austen, George Eliot, the Brontes.
I grew up reading 'Sense and Sensibility' and 'Pride and Prejudice' - girly kind of books.
One reviewer dubbed my first book, 'Getting Rid of Matthew,' 'chick noir,' and another called it 'anti chick lit,' both of which I loved.
Chick lit was amazing, and I was thrilled to be part of it.
Sappho and Emily Dickinson are the only woman geniuses in poetic history.
... I find myself coming out of the library with all women writers. I keep hoping the library attendant won't notice, but when 8 out of 8 of the books you take out are by women, you try not to look too dykey.
Chick Lit uses humor to reflect life back to us. It's a very comforting genre, and it's the first time our generation has had a voice. It's a very important genre for all of those reasons.
I blurb a lot of books by women, and I'm eager to provide encouragement and support for young women.
There used to be a category called women's fiction - meaning not too rude, not too much sex, a bit domestic and internal. Women have changed so much. We're so varied. And we've become more interested in the same varied experience in fiction.
I grew up with 'Jane Eyre,' reading it at school, and it's one of those, I think, for a lot of women, a lot of girls, it's the iconic story and so many girls relate to Jane Eyre and her character.
I say, 'I write romance, women's fiction, chick lit.' I think it all fits very comfortably under the same umbrella. Basically, I write books for women - books about relationships: books that make you laugh and sometimes make you cry a little.
'Little Women' made me into a reader.
It's a woman's book but I think the men will read it too.
In the fall of 1973, Erica Jong assaulted the last surviving bastions of old-fashioned modesty with her 'Fear of Flying.'
I love 'Jane Eyre,' and I love the Bronte sisters. I actually didn't read any of them until I was in college, so I don't have quite the same connection with them that I think a lot of women do.
There aren't very many good models of feminine rage - and the ones that we remember are ones where women take that anger internally and implode themselves in a real way, like Anna Karenina or Emma Bovary.
I love 19th century fiction and, in particular, fiction written by and about women.
Chick-lit may be staggering on its heels, but women's fiction is alive and kicking.
Most of my writer friends are women, and they're all extremely talented, so of course I think the state of contemporary fiction for women is pretty great. Which is to say there is a ton of amazing work out there. These women are writing hard. There's much to be said. We're on it, chief.
I love writing for and about women. In my whole career I have.
I think women love to read love stories.
Before novels written by women were relegated to their own 'genre,' I was introduced to Jane Smiley by a dear professor who raised my awareness of what female authors were bringing to the table of contemporary fiction.
What bothered me most about chick lit, frankly, was how the term was used to dismiss a huge chunk of the bookstore as silly, girlish prattle.
'Little Women' has interesting gender connotations. There are generations of women who love the book. But there are a lot of men who think it's sentimental, gooey stuff.
Many of the narratives can only tend to excite ideas the worst calculated for a female breast: Every thing is called plainly and roundly by its name; and the annals of a Brothel would scarcely furnish a greater choice of indecent expressions. Yet this is the Book, which young Women are recommended to study.
