My kids are supposed to live till they are one hundred. You don't have to have a perfect house or a perfect relationship with your child or a perfect child, and you yourself do not have to be perfect.

If you grow up in Ireland and read books then you really are obliged to attempt your own some time. It is not exactly a choice. I still don't know if I am a writer. Believe me, there are days when I have my doubts.

I became a full-time writer in 1993 and have been very happy, insofar as anybody is, since.

When you find yourself alone, or in a transition, you dream more. These are also the times when you read books.

Remember, if you sit at your desk for 15 or 20 years, every day, not counting weekends, it changes you. It just does. It may not improve your temper, but it fixes something else. It makes you more free.

I do not believe in evil- I believe that we are human and fallible, that we things and spoil them in an ordinary way.

I think you know everything at eight. But is is hidden from you, sealed up, in a way you have to cut yourself open to find.