Ethan was encouraged to write by his high school English teacher. Then he went to the Iowa Workshop and was discouraged by something John Irving said. So he went to medical school at Harvard and became a doctor. But something made him return to writing and suddenly The Palace Thief was published to great reviews, and several other books, and now America, America and Ethan has grown into one of our top writers. And who was his prescient high school teacher who had encouraged him to write. . . . .none other than Danielle Steele.