Adriana Trigiani

“I live in the greatest city in the world for research.”

“We hang out, we help one another, we tell one another our worst fears and biggest secrets, and then, just like real sisters, we listen and don't judge.”

“I fell in love with reading when I was allowed to choose whatever books I wanted to check out of the library.”

“I used to walk to Altman's on Saturdays for lunch at the Charleston Garden, which had a coconut cake that is still my favorite food in the world.”

“I'm very organized - and the best thing - when you love your work, you don't mind putting in 15 hour days. It's joyful.”

“Who's the artist?""My favorite." She pauses. "Unknown." Edydie sits cross-legged on the couch. "There is something so pure about an artist creating something for the sheer joy of it, then sharing it with people and claiming no credit. To me that's the height of romance.”

“I write novels about women, except for one: 'Rococo', about a man, a New Jersey decorator. But even that book had a woman on the cover.”

“People have often told me that one of their strongest childhood memories is the scent of their grandmother's house. I never knew my grandmothers, but I could always count of the Bookmobile.”

“I fell in love with reading when I was allowed to choose whatever books I wanted to check out of the library. I was around nine years old when I began choosing my own books in earnest.”

“I'm a dramatist, so I really always wrote and directed at the same time because when I wrote something, I always put it on its feet. So I'm in love with actors; I always loved actors.”

“Romy had never done a budget, Marisol had never designed costumes and sets, and Suzanne had never acted, but when I asked them to help, they didn't hesitate”

“And so, when I was a young writer I always worked hard on imagery, and I knew that the roots of imagery were the senses - and that if my readers could feel, taste and see what I was talking about, I would be able to tell them a story.”

“The terrible things that happen to us in life never make any sense when we're in the middle of them, floundering, no end in sight. There is no rope to hang on to, it seems. Mothers can soothe children during those times, through their reassurance. No one worries about you like your mother, and when she is gone, the world seems unsafe, things that happen unwieldy. You cannot turn to her anymore, and it changes your life forever. There is no one on earth who knew you from the day you were born; who knew why you cried, or when you'd had enough food; who knew exactly what to say when you were hurting; and who encouraged you to grow a good heart. When that layer goes, whatever is left of your childgood goes with her. Memories are very different and cannot soothe you the same way her touch did.”

“The Calandra Institute, the Metropolitan Opera Archives, the library at Lincoln Center, and the Fashion Institute of Technology were helpful and key to piecing together what life must have been like at the turn of the last century.”

“Be in community, go out to dinner together, do things together. We lose that, we lose a lot. It's important to come together.”

“But the most precious research to me came from the paperwork filed on behalf of my grandparents and great-grandfather. The ship's manifest showed that they could read and write. I am still emotional when I look at those boxes checked yes.”

“You never know when some small thing will lead to a big idea. Travel is very inspirational - but it's in the ordinary that I find my themes of love and work and family.”

“The 'Story of Silent Night', which was given to me one Christmas when I was six - it was the story of a down and out composer who had no ideas left, and it was Christmas, and he came up with the hymn 'Silent Night.'”

“I understand how a first impression is often just that: a quick snapshot that, on its own merit, is meaningless.”

“I loved to read, still do, and it seemed that the writing was a result of the love of books and reading and libraries.”