The secret to being a writer is that you have to write. It's not enough to think about writing or to study literature or plan a future life as an author. You really have to lock yourself away alone and get to work.
I always have one or two sometimes more Navajo or other tribes' cultural elements in mind when I start a plot. In Thief of Time I wanted to make readers aware of Navajo attitude toward the dead respect for burial sites.
