The first duty of the novelist is to entertain. It is a moral duty. People who read your books are sick, sad, traveling, in the hospital waiting room while someone is dying. Books are written by the alone for the alone. --Donna Tartt
There's nothing more meaningful to me as a writer than to get a letter from a reader telling me that one of my stories let them forget, for a while, their pain or grief or fear. It's the reward for all those hours in solitary, staring at a blank page on a screen, willing the story to come, fearing it won't. The oddest thing about it is that I write for me. I write the kind of story I want to read. That so many others also want to read them is a gift I treasure. What a wonderful symbiosis!
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June, 2003
Summer is almost here. You can feel it in the air up here in the Northwest. And see it in the increased number of times the weather forecasters are wrong, and the predicted rain never appears! It's a busy time, the robins are fighting their own reflections in the effort to drive off their "rival" (entertaining when you have one at almost every window in the house) the dreaded horde of tent caterpillars are chowing down on their choice of trees, preparing to festoon every north facing wall with cocoons, and spiders the size of golf balls begin to show up.
Lest you think I'm kidding about those spiders, let me tell you about my first night in this house. I was in the family room, alone since I had moved ahead of my husband because of a deadline, rather than try and move in the middle of writing a book. So there I am being nobly industrious, proofreading, when I glance up and see a black spider who could have been cast in the last Harry Potter movie. Did I mention I Don't Do Spiders? (My husband and I have always had a pact-his thing is snakes, so I handle less than four legs while he handles more than four legs. Unfortunately, he was not present to do his duty...) So, after a moment of waffling, afraid if I left he'd disappear and I'd know he was inside somewhere and never be able to sleep in this house, I ran for the vacuum cleaner. Caught him just as a clue something was wrong got through to his spidery little brain. Sucked him up. Or tried to-he grabbed the rim of the vacuum nozzle. I swear, I could see his little feet sticking out past the edge. And when he finally let go, I could feel him go by in the hose. Shudder.
But don't go thinking I'm not happy here in nature's wonderland. I am, I am. This spring I was witness to a rare and beautiful thing. Something I've seen on film and read about, even seen in paintings, something most people never get to see in person. And it happened practically in my yard. What was it? A bald eagle courtship flight. For those not as enraptured with raptors as I, a courtship flight is one of the most incredible things in nature. Two eagles flying one above the other. Suddenly the upper one dives toward the mate. Incredibly, the mate does a sharp roll and actually flies upside down. They lock 
talons and then tumble together like a crazed, feathered pinwheel. Over and over and over, until it seems impossible they won't crash. At the last second they break apart, right themselves, and soar on. It's a sight impossible to fully describe, you simply have to see it. It stopped my breath and it took nearly an hour for me to come down.
I'm hoping it was a sign there will be an eaglet or two this year. Rebirth, renewal, the hope for the future that is sometimes the only thing that keeps us plugging away. They're the things that I write about. The things that are at the core of all my stories. I write about hope and trust and love because they're so precious. They're precious because they're not easy. And in their purest form they're priceless. I write about them in fiction, because I can't guarantee them in real life. But we need them to live. Otherwise we're just surviving. And that's why I do what I do, and that's why it's one of the most important-and yet undervalued-things any writer can do.
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Justine
