The 30-year-old daughter of former VP Al Gore lives near downtown with husband Paul Cusack, writes for "Saturday Night Live" and "Futurama" and has a new novel, Sammy's House, coming in July. Her main character is a 28-year-old White House policy analyst named Samantha Joyce who has a president mired in personal scandal while an ethical vice president cleans up the mess. Gore tells Women's Health about the book and her odd phobia.

Who was the inspiration for Sammy?

There's this perception of DC as a boring town run by old white men, but in reality, there are incredibly young people in charge of really important things. You'd be amazed that there's a 26-year-old writing health-care policy. So I wanted to show that kind of person, because I grew up surrounded by them.

Do you share any qualities with her?

I do have a wrist phobia like she does. The wrists, the Achilles' tendons, and the neck are some of the weakest points of the human body, so a lot of people have phobias about those things. I can't deal with the undersides of wrists.

You don't like looking at them?

I don't like looking at them, I can't have people touch them, and when they show wrist-slashing suicides in movies, I hyperventilate. Also like Sammy, I have the blood of more pet fish on my hands than I would care to dwell on.

Now we know about that.