SR: 3. Your first novel, "Breaking Boxes", won the 1996 Delacorte Prize for a first novel, how did winning this award change or even act as a catalyst to your writing career?
AM: Well, for one thing I was at the point of giving up writing. I'd been writing for several years, trying to get published, and had found what I loved more than anything (YA) and I felt I was as good as I could get, without the added benefit of editorial direction. In the months before the contest winners were announced, I was ready to admit I was a total washout, since my best obviously wasn't good enough. When I got the call that my ms had won, I bawled like a baby, it was such a relief--more than a relief, to finally get that kind of validation.
SR: 4. Where you a reader as a child? Do you have a favorite book from your childhood? Has there been any book that you have read that has changed your life?
AM: I read constantly. The bookmobile came once a week, and I'd walk a block with books stacked up to my chin. I had so many favorite books over the years, I couldn't even begin to name them.
One thing that has struck me is that some of the books I loved and reread many times disappeared and went out of print. I don't think it occurred to me until I started writing that books didn't last forever. But most of them don't--even books like the ones I read, that touched me considerably.
SR:5.I hesitate to say your books remind me of a "modern day or comtemporary" S. H. Hinton. I believe she is also from Texas. Your characters are in many ways "outsiders" themselves. Is there any influence from this writer?
AM: I think she's from Oklahoma. Close enough. I read S.E. Hinton as a young teenager, but I wouldn't say she influenced me any more than any other writer. Other than starting the whole YA genre, ha ha.
SR: 6. What is the very best writing advice you have ever received?
AM: It's hard to say, because different writing advice has been helpful at different stages of my career. When I first started out, I had a big
